The 
Bradford  A.  Booth  Collection 


in 


English  and  American 
Literature 


MODERN 

ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF 
POWER 


MODERN 

ENGLISH  BOOKS 

OF  POWER 


"A  GOOD  BOOK  Is  THE  PRECIOUS 

LIFE-BLOOD  OF  A  MASTER  SPIRIT,  EMBALMED  AND  TREASURED 

UP  ON  PURPOSE  TO  A  LIFE  BEYOND  LIFE." 

MILTON;  AREOPAGITICA 


ILLUSTRATED 


BARSE     &     HOPKINS 
NEW  YORK  NEWARK 

N.  Y.  N.  J. 


Copyright,  1911 
by  BARSE  &  HOPKINS 


The  articles  in  this 

book  appeared  originally  in  the 

Sunday  book-page  of  the  San  Francisco  Chronicle. 

The  privilege  of  reproducing  them 

here  is  due  to  the  courtesy  of 

M.  H.  de  Young,  Esq. 


TO  AMERIQUE 

WHOSE 

LOVE  AND  ENCOURAGEMENT 

HELPED  ME  TO  WRITE 

THIS  BOOK 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

INTRODUCTION 5x 

THE  VITAL  QUALITY  IN  LITERATURE    ....        xi 
To  Get  the  Spiritual  Essence  of  a  Great  Book  One  Must 
Study  the  Man  Who  Wrote  It— The  Man  Is  the  Best 
Epitome  of  His  Message. 

MACAULAY'S  ESSAYS  IN  EUROPEAN  HISTORY  .      .         3 
Foremost  English  Essayist  — His  Style  and  Learning  Have 
Made  Macaulay  a  Favorite  for  Over  a  Half  Century. 

SCOTT  AND  His  WAVERLEY  NOVELS     ....      1 1 

Greatest  Novelist  the  World  Has  Known  —  Made  History 
Real  and  Created  Charafters  That  Will  Never  Die. 

CARLYLE  AS  AN  INSPIRER  OF  YOUTH    ....      20 

Finest  English  Prose  Writer — His  Best  Books,  Past  and 
Present,  Sartor  Resartus  and  the  French  Revolution. 

DE  QUINCEY  AS  A  MASTER  OF  STYLE  ....      30 

He  Wrote  the  Confessions  of  an  English  Opium-Eater — 
Dreamed  Dreams  and  Saw  Visions  and  Pidtured  Them 
in  Poetic  Prose. 

CHARLES  LAMB  AND  THE  ESSAYS  OF  ELIA  .      .      .      38 
Best  Beloved  of  All  the  English  Writers — Quaintest  and 
Tenderest  Essayist  Whose  Work  Appeals  to  All  Hearts. 

DICKENS,  THE  FOREMOST  OF  NOVELISTS     ...      47 
More  Widely  Read  Than  Any  Other  Story -Teller— The 
Greatest   of  the    Modern    Humorists    Appeals   to    the 
Readers  of  AH  Ages  and  Classes. 

THACKERAY,  GREATEST  MASTER  OF  FICTION  .      .      56 

The  Most  Accomplished  Writer  of  His  Century— Tender 
Pathos  Under  an  Affeftation  of  Cynicism  and  Great 
Art  in  Style  and  Characters. 


CONTENTS 

PAGE 

CHARLOTTE  BRONTE':  HER  Two  GREAT  NOVELS      66 

Jane  Eyre  and  VUlette  are  Touched  With  Genius— The 
Tragedy  of  a  Woman's  Life  That  Resulted  in  Two 
Stories  of  Passionate  Revolt  Against  Fate. 

GEORGE  ELIOT  AND  HER  Two  GREAT  NOVELS   .      76 

Adam  Bede  and  The  Mill  on  the  Floss— Her  Early  Stories 
Are  Rich  in  Character  Sketches,  With  Much  Humor 
and  Pathos. 

RUSKIN,  THE  APOSTLE  OF  ART 87 

Art  Critic  and  Social  Reformer— Best  Books  Are  Modern 
Painters,  The  Seven  Lamps  and  The  Stones  of  Venice. 

TENNYSON  LEADS  THE  VICTORIAN  WRITERS    .      .      96 
A  Poet  Who  Voiced  the  Aspirations  of  His  Age— Lor/b/<ry 
Hall,  In  Memorian  and  The  Idylls  of  the  King  Among 
His  Best  Works. 

BROWNING,  GREATEST  POET  SINCE  SHAKESPEARE  .    106 
How  to  Get  the  Bes*-  of  Browning's    Poems  — Read  the 
Lyrics  First  and  Then  Take  Up  the  Longer  and  the 
More  Difficult  Works. 

MEREDITH  AND  A  FEW  OF  His  BEST  NOVELS  .      .115 
One  of  the  Greatest  Masters  of  Fiction  of  the  Last  Cen- 
tury—  The   Ordeal  of  Richard   Fe-verel,   Diana  of  the 
Cross-ways  and  Other  Novels. 

STEVENSON,  PRINCE  OF  MODERN  STORY-TELLERS    123 

His  Stories  of  Adventure  and  Brilliant  Essays  —  Treasure 
Island  and  Dr.  Jekyll  and  Mr.  Hyde  His  Most  Poo- 
ular  Books. 

THOMAS  HARDY;  His  TRAGIC  TALES  OF  WESSEX    I  3  I 
Greatest  Living  Writer  of  English  Fiction— Resenting  Harsh 
Criticisms,  the  Prose  Master  Turns  to  Verse . 

KIPLING'S  BEST  SHORT  STORIES  AND  POEMS     .      .140 

Tales  of  East  Indian  Life  and  Character — Ideal  Training 
of  the  Genius  That  Has  Produced  Some  of  the  Best 
Literary  Work  of  Our  Day. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 151 

Short  Notes  of  Both  Standard  and  Other  Editions,  With 
Lives,  Sketches  and  Reminiscences. 

INDEX 165 


[vi] 


ILLUSTRATIONS 

FACING 
PAGE 

Charles  Dickens  Reading  The  Chimes  at  58  Lincoln's  Inn 
Fields  on  the  Second  of  December,  1844.  From  a  Sketch 
by  Daniel  Maclise,  R.  A Title 

Thomas  Babington  Macaulay  at  the  Age  of  Forty-nine— After 
an  Engraving  by  W.  Holl,  from  a  Drawing  by  George 
Richmond,  A.  R.  A 6 

Sir  Walter  Scott— This  Portrait  is  taken  from  Chantrey's 
Bust  now  at  Abbotsford,  which,  according  to  Lockhart, 

"Alone  Preserves  for  Posterity  the  Expression  most  fondly 
Remembered  by  All  who  Ever  Mingled  in  his  Domestic 
Circle." II 

White  Horse  Inn— From  an  Illustration  to  Wa-verley,  Drawn 

by  G.  Cattermole  and  Engraved  by  E.  Finden  .        .        .        14 

Thomas  Car lyle— From  the  World-Famed    Masterpiece   of 

Portraiture  by  James  McNeill  Whistler      ....        20 

Archhouse,  Ecclefechan,  Dumfriesshire,  the  Birthplace  of 
Thomas  Carlyle — From  a  Photograph  in  the  Possession  of 
Alexander  Carlyle,  M.  A.,  on  which  Carlyle  has  Written 
a  Memorandum  to  Show  in  which  Room  he  was  Born  .  26 

Thomas  De  Quincey— From  an  old  Engraving      .        .        .        30 

De  Quincey  with  Two  Daughters  and  Grandchild — From  a 

Chalk  Drawing  by  James  Archer,  R.  S.  A., made  in  1855        34 

Charles  Lamb— From  the  Portrait  by  William  Hazlitt         .        38 

Mary  and  Charles  Lamb — From  the  Painting  by  F.  S.  Gary 

made  in  1834 44 

Charles    Dickens  at  the  Age  of  Twenty-seven— From  the 

Portrait  by  Daniel  Maclise,  R.  A 48 

Original  Pickwick  Cover  Issued  in  1837  with  Dickens'  Auto- 
graph—  Most  of  Dickens'  Novels  were  Issued  in  Shilling 
Installments  before  being  Published  in  the  Complete  Volume  53. 

William  Makepeace  Thackeray— From  a  Drawing  by  Samuel 

Laurence,  Engraved  by  J.  C.  Armytage     ....        56 

Title-page  to  Vanity  Fair,  Drawn  by  Thackeray,  who  Fur- 
nished the  Illustrations  for  Many  of  his  Earlier  Editions  58 


[vii] 


ILLUSTRATIONS  FACING 

PAGE 

William    Makepeace    Thackeray — A   Caricature   Drawn  by 

Himself 62 

Charlotte  Bronte— From  the  Exquisitely  Sympathetic  Crayon 
Portrait  by  George  Richmond,  R.  A.,  now  in  the  National 
Portrait  Gallery  of  London 66 

Mrs.  Gaskell  — From  the  Portrait  by  George  Richmond,  R.  A. 
Mrs.  Gaskell's  Life  of  Bronte  is  one  of  the  Finest  Biog- 
raphies in  the  Language 7* 

George  Eliot  in  1864— From  the  Etching  by  Mr.  Paul  Rajon — 
Drawn  by  Mr.  Frederick  Burton  — From  the  Frontispiece 
to  the  First  Edition  of  George  Eliot'1  s  Life,  by  Her  Hus- 
band, J.  W.  Cross 76 

George  Eliot's  Birthplace,  South  Farm,  Arbury,  Nuneaton.        80 

John  Ruskin— From  a  Photograph  Taken  on  July  20, 1882, 

by  Messrs.  Elliott  &  Fry 88 

John  Ruskin — From  the  Semi-Romantic  Portrait  by  Sir  John 

E.  Millais 92 

Lord  Alfred  Tennyson — After  an  Engraving  by  G.  J.  Stodart 

From  a  Photograph  by  J.  Mayall 96 

Facsimile  of  Tennyson's  Original  Manuscript  of  Crossing  the 

Bar.  (Copyright  by  the  Macmillan  Company)  .  .  .100 

Robert  Browning — From  a  Photograph  by  Hollyer  after  the 

Portrait  by  G.  F.  Watts,  R.  A 106 

Elizabeth  Barrett  Browning— After  the  Portrait  by  Field  Tal- 

fourd no 

George  Meredith  with  His  Daughter  and  Grandchildren — 

From  a  Photograph  Taken  Shortly  Before  His  Death  .  118 

Flint  Cottage,  Boxhill,  the  Home  of  George  Meredith — His 

Writing  was  done  in  a  Small  Swiss  Chalet  in  the  Garden  120 

Robert  Louis  Stevenson — The  Author's  Intimate  Associates 
Pronounce  this  Photograph  a  Perfedl  Presentation  of  His 
Most  Typical  Expression 126 

Stevenson's  Home  at  Valima,  Samoa,  Looking  Toward  Vaea      128 

Thomas  Hardy  — A  Portrait  Which  Brings  Out  Strikingly  the 
Man  of  Creative  Power,  the  Artist,  the  Philosopher  and 
the  Poet 132 

Rudyard  Kipling — A  Striking  Likeness  of  the  Author  in  a 

Characteristic  Pose 140 

Rudyard  Kipling — From  a  Cartoon  by  W.  Nicholson    .         .       144 


viiil 


Introduction 

ll/Traim  in  this  little  book  has  been  to  give 
J.VJL  short  sketches  and  estimates  of  the 
greatest  modern  English  writers  from  Mac- 
aulay  to  Stevenson  and  Kipling.  Omissions 
there  are,  but  my  effort  has  been  to  give  the 
most  characteristic  writers  a  place  and  to  try 
to  stimulate  the  reader  s  interest  in  the  man 
behind  the  book  as  well  as  in  the  best  works 
of  each  author.  ¥00  much  space  is  devoted  in 
most  literary  criticism  to  the  bare  faffs  of 
biography  and  the  details  of  essays  or  novels 
or  histories  written  by  authors.  My  plan  has 
been  to  arouse  interest  both  in  the  men  and 
their  books  so  that  any  reader  of  this  volume 
may  be  stimulated  to  extend  his  knowledge  of 
the  modern  English  classics. 

'These  chapters  include  the  greatest  English 
writers  during  the  last  one  hundred  and  fifty 
years  and  they  have  been  prepared  mainly  for 
those  who  have  no  thorough  knowledge  of 
modern  English  books  or  authors.  They  are 
of  limited  scope  so  that  few  quotations  have 
been  possible.  But  they  have  been  written 
with  an  eager  desire  to  help  those  who  care 
to  know  the  best  works  of  modern  English 


Introduction 

authors.  In  the  same  spirit  the  most  appro- 
priate illustrations  have  been  secured  and  a 
helpful  bibliography  has  been  added.  If  this 
book  helps  readers  to  secure  one  lasting  friend 
among  these  authors  it  will  have  done  good 
missionary  work ;  for  to  make  the  books  of  one 
man  or  woman  of  genius  a  part  of  our  mental 
possessions  is  to  be  set  on  the  broad  highway 
to  literary  culture. 


Vital  Quality  in 
Literature 

To  Get  the  Spiritual  Essence  of  a  Great 
Book  One  Must  Study  the  Man  Who 
Wrote  It-T/ie  Man  Is  the  Best  Epit- 
ome of  His  Message. 

/N  this  volume  as  in  its  predecessor," Com- 
fort Found  in  Good  Old  Books  "my  aim 
lias  been  to  enforce  the  theory  that  behind 
every  great  book  is  a  man^  greater  than  the 
best  book  that  he  ever  wrote.  This  strong 
spiritual  quality  which  every  one  of  the  great 
authors  puts  into  his  best  books  is  what  we 
should  strive  to  secure  when  we  read  these 
great  classics.  Unless  we  get  this  spiritual 
part  we  miss  the  essence  of  the  book. 

Hence  it  has  been  my  aim  in  this  volume 
to  make  clear  what  manner  of  men  wrote 
these  books  which  serve  as  the  landmarks  of 
modern  English  literature. 

The  scope  of  this  book  is  limited,  but  from 
Macaulay  to  Kipling  the  effort  has  been  to 

[xi] 


The  Vital  Quality  in  Literature 

include  those  representative  modern  English 
authors  who  both  in  prose  and  verse  best 
refleff  the  spiritual  tendencies  of  their  age. 
Whether  essayists,  historians,  novelists  or 
poets  each  of  these  writers  has  furnished 
something  distinctive;  each  has  caught  some 
salient  feature  of  his  age  and  fixed  it  for  all 
time  in  the  amber  of  his  thought. 

And  what  a  bead-roll  is  this  of  great 
English  worthies:  Macaulay,  the  most  bril- 
liant and  learned  of  all  English  essayists; 
Scott,  the  finest  story-teller  of  his  own  or  any 
other  age;  Carlyle,  the  inspirer  of  ambitious 
youth;  De  ^uincey,  the  greatest  artist  in  style, 
whose  words  are  as  music  to  the  sensitive 
ear;  Dickens,  the  master  painter  of  sorrows 
and  joys  of  the  common  people;  'Thackeray, 
the  best  interpreter  of  human  life  and  char- 
acler;  Charlotte  Bronte,  the  brooding  Celtic 
genius  who  laid  bare  the  hearts  of  women; 
George  Eliot,  the  greatest  artist  of  her  sex 
in  mastery  of  human  emotion;  Ruskin,  the 
first  to  teach  the  common  people  appreciation 
of  art  and  architecture;  Tennyson,  the  melodi- 
ous singer  who  voiced  the  highest  aspiration 
of  his  time;  Browning,  the  greatest  dramatic 
poet  since  Shakespeare;  Charles  Lamb,  one 
of  the  tender est  of  essayists;  George  Mere- 
dith, the  most  brilliant  and  suggestive  novelist 

[xii] 


The  Vital  Quality  in  Literature 

of  the  Victorian  age;  Stevenson,  the  best 
beloved  and  most  artistic  story-teller  of  his 
day;  Hardy,  the  master  •painter  of  tragedies 
of  rural  life;  and  Kipling,  the  interpreter  of 
Anglo-Indian  life,  the  singer  of  the  new  age 
of  science  and  discovery,  the  laureate  of  the 
gospel  of  blood  and  iron. 

'The  work  of  each  of  these  men  and  women 
who  make  up  the  splendid  roll  of  English 
immortals  varies  in  quality,  in  style,  in  capac- 
ity to  touch  the  heart  and  inspire  the  thought 
of  the  reader  of  to-day.  But  great  as  are  their 
differences,  all  meet  on  the  common  ground  of 
a  warm-hearted,  sympathetic  humanity  that 
knows  no  distinctions  of  race  or  creed,  no  lim- 
itations of  time  or  place.  The  splendid  ser- 
mons on  the  gospel  of  work  that  Carlyle 
preached  after  long  wrestlings  of  the  spirit 
are  as  full  of  inspiration  to  the  youth  of  to-day 
as  they  were  when  they  came  out  from  the 
mind  of  the  man  who  actually  lived  the  labo- 
rious life  that  he  commended;  the  little  lay 
discourses  that  may  be  found  scattered  through 
Thackeray 's  novels  and  essays  are  born  of 
agony  of  spirit,  and  it  is  their  spiritual  power 
which  keeps  them  fresh  and  full  of  inspira- 
tion in  this  age  of  doubt  and  materialism. 

And  so  we  might  go  down  through  the 
whole  list.  Each  of  these  great  writers  had 

[xiii] 


The  Vital  Quality  in  Literature 

his  Gethsemane,from  which  he  emerged  with 
the  power  of  moving  the  hearts  of  men.  So 
when  we  read  that  most  beautiful  essay  of 
Lamb's  on  "Dream  Children  "our  hearts  ache 
for  the  lonely  man  who  sacrificed  the  best 
things  in  life  for  the  sake  of  the  sister  whom 
he  loved  better  than  his  own  happiness.  And 
when  we  read  Thackeray's  eloquent  words  on 
family  love  we  know  that  he  wrote  in  his 
heart's  blood,  for  the  dearest  woman  in  the 
world  to  him  was  lost  forever  in  this  world, 
when  the  light  of  her  reason  was  clouded. 

And  so  I  have  tried  in  these  essays  to  show 
how  bitter  waters  of  sorrow  have  strength- 
ened the  spirit  of  all  these  masters  of  English 
thought  and  style,  until  they  have  poured  out 
their  hearts  in  eloquent  words  that  can  never 
die.  Far  across  the  gulf  of  years  their  sono- 
rous voices  reach  our  ears.  Pregnant  are  they 
with  the  passionate  earnestness  of  these  men 
and  women  of  genius,  these  bearers  of  the 
torch  of  spiritual  inspiration  passed  from  hand 
to  hand  down  the  centuries. 

When  our  souls  are  moved  by  some  great 
bereavement  then  the  words  of  these  inspired 
writers  soothe  our  griefs.  When  we  are  beaten 
down  in  the  dust  of  conflict  they  come  with 
the  refreshment  of  water  from  springs  in  the 
everlasting  hills.  When  we  are  bitter  over 

fxivl 


The  Vital  Duality  in  Literature 

great  losses  or  sore  over  hope  deferred  or 
stricken  because  friends  have  proved  faith- 
less, then  they  soften  our  hearts  and  give  us 
courage  to  take  up  once  more  the  battle  of  life. 


[xv] 


MODERN 

ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF 
POWER 


MACAULAY'S 

ESSAYS  IN  EUROPEAN 

HISTORY 

THE  FOREMOST  ESSAYIST  IN  ENGLISH 
LITERATURE— His  STYLE  AND  LEARNING 
HAVE  MADE  MACAULAY  A  FAVORITE 
FOR  OVER  A  HALF  CENTURY. 

MACAULAY  belonged  to  the  nineteenth 
century,  as  he  was  born  in  1800,  but 
in  his  cast  of  mind,  in  his  literary  tastes  and 
in  his  intense  partisanship  he  belonged  to 
the  century  that  includes  Swift,  Johnson 
and  Goldsmith.  He  stands  alone  among 
famous  English  authors  by  reason  of  his 
prodigious  memory,  his  wide  reading,  his 
oratorical  style  and  his  singular  ascendancy 
over  the  minds  of  young  students.  The 
only  writers  of  modern  times  who  can  be 
classed  with  him  as  great  personal  forces 
in  the  development  of  young  minds  are 
Carlyle  and  Emerson,  and  of  the  three 
Macaulay  must  be  given  first  place  because 
of  a  certain  dynamic  quality  in  the  man 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

and  his  style  which  forces  conviction  on 
the  mind  of  the  immature  reader.  The 
same  thing  to  a  less  extent  is  true  of  Carlyle, 
who  suffers  in  his  influence  as  one  grows 
older.  Emerson  is  in  a  class  by  himself. 
His  appeal  is  that  of  pure  reason  and  of 
high  enthusiasm— an  appeal  that  never 
loses  its  force  with  those  who  love  the  intel- 
lectual life. 

Many  famous  men  have  testified  to  the 
mental  stimulus  which  they  received  from 
Macaulay's  essays.  Upon  these  essays, 
contributed  to  the  EDINBURGH  REVIEW  in 
its  prime,  Macaulay  lavished  all  the  re- 
sources of  his  vast  scholarship,  his  discur- 
sive reading  in  the  ancient  and  modern 
classics,  his  immense  enthusiasm  and  his 
strong  desire  to  prove  his  case.  He  was 
a  great  advocate  before  he  was  a  great 
writer,  and  he  never  loses  sight  of  the  jury 
of  his  readers.  He  blackens  the  shadows 
and  heightens  the  lights  in  order  to  make 
heroes  out  of  Clive  and  Warren  Hastings; 
he  hammers  Boswell  and  Boswell's  editor, 
Croker,  over  the  sacred  head  of  old  Dr. 
Johnson;  he  lampoons  every  eminentTory, 
as  he  idealizes  every  prominent  Whig  in 
English  political  history.  Macaulay's  style 
is  declamatory;  he  wrote  as  though  he  were 

[4] 


MACAULAY'S  ESSAYS  IN  HISTORY 

to  deliver  his  essays  from  the  rostrum;  he 
abounds  in  antithesis;  he  works  up  your 
interest  in  the  course  of  a  long  paragraph 
until  he  reaches  his  smashing  climax,  in 
which  he  fixes  indelibly  in  your  mind  the 
impression  which  he  desires  to  create.  It 
is  all  like  a  great  piece  of  legerdemain; 
your  eyes  cannot  follow  the  processes,  but 
your  mind  is  amazed  and  then  convinced 
by  the  triumphant  proof  of  the  conjuror's 
skill. 

Macaulay  had  one  of  the  most  successful 
of  lives.  His  early  advantages  were  ample. 
He  had  a  memory  which  made  everything 
he  read  his  own,  ready  to  be  drawn  upon 
at  a  moment's  notice.  He  was  famous  as 
an  author  at  the  early  age  of  twenty-five; 
he  was  already  a  distinguished  Parliamen- 
tary orator  at  thirty;  at  thirty-three  he  had 
gained  a  place  in  the  East  Indian  Council. 
He  never  married,  but  he  had  an  ideal 
domestic  life  in  the  home  of  his  sister,  and 
one  of  his  nephews,  George  Otto  Trevel- 
yan,  wrote  his  biography,  one  of  the  best 
in  the  language,  which  reveals  the  sweet- 
ness of  nature  that  lay  under  the  hard 
surface  of  Macaulay's  character.  He  made 
a  fortune  out  of  his  books,  and  in  ten  years' 
service  in  India  he  gained  another  fortune, 

[5] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 
with  the  leisure  for  wide  reading:,  which  he 

O  y 

utilized  in  writing  his  history  of  England. 
He  died  at  the  height  of  his  fame,  before 
his  great  mental  powers  had  shown  any 
sign  of  decay.  Take  it  all  in  all,  his  was  a 
happy  life,  brimful  of  work  and  enjoyment. 

Thomas  Babington  Macaulay  was  born 
October  25,  1800,  the  son  of  a  wealthy 
merchant  who  was  active  in  securing  the 
abolition  of  the  slave  trade.  His  precocity 
is  almost  beyond  belief.  He  read  at  three 
years  of  age,  gave  signs  of  his  marvelous 
memory  at  four,  and  when  only  eight 
years  old  wrote  a  theological  discourse.  He 
entered  Trinity  College,  Cambridge,  at 
eighteen,  but  his  aversion  to  mathematics 
cost  him  college  honors.  He  showed  at 
Cambridge  great  fondness  for  Latin  decla- 
mation and  for  poetry.  At  twenty-four  he 
became  a  fellow  of  Trinity.  He  studied 
law,  but  did  not  practice.  Literature  and 
politics  absorbed  his  attention.  At  twenty- 
five  he  made  his  first  hit  with  his  essay  on 
Milton  in  the  EDINBURGH  REVIEW. 

This  was  followed  in  rapid  succession 
by  the  series  of  essays  on  which  his  fame 
mainly  rests.  In  1830  he  was  elected  to 
Parliament,  and  in  the  following  year  he 
established  his  reputation  as  an  orator  by 

[6] 


THOMAS  BABINGTON  MACAULAY 

AT  THE  AGE  OF  FORTY-NINE— AFTER  AN  ENGRAVING 

BY  W.  HOLL,  FROM  A  DRAWING  BY 

GEORGE  RICHMOND,  A.  R.  A. 


MACAULAY'S  ESSAYS  IN  HISTORY 

a  great  speech  on  the  reform  bill.  But 
financial  reverses  came  when  he  lost  the 
lucrative  post  of  Commissioner  in  Bank- 
ruptcy and  his  fellowship  atTrinity  lapsed. 
To  gain  an  income  he  accepted  the  position 
of  secretary  of  the  Board  of  Control  of 
Indian  Affairs,  and  soon  after  was  offered 
a  seat  in  the  Supreme  Council  of  India  at 
Calcutta  at  $50,000  a  year.  He  lived  in 
India  four  years,  and  it  was  mainly  in  these 
years  that  he  did  the  reading  which  after- 
ward bore  fruit  in  his  History  of  England. 
At  thirty-nine  Macaulay  began  his  His- 
tory of  England,  which  continued  to  absorb 
most  of  his  time  for  the  next  twenty  years. 
While  he  was  working  on  his  history  he 
published  Lays  of  Ancient  Rome,  that  had 
a  success  scarcely  inferior  to  that  of  Scott's 
Lady  of  the  Lake  or  Byron's  Childe  Harold. 
He  also  published  his  essays, which  had  a 
remarkable  sale.  His  history,  the  first  two 
volumes  of  which  appeared  in  1 848,  scored 
a  success  that  astounded  all  the  critics. 
When  the  third  volume  appeared  in  1855, 
no  less  than  twenty-six  thousand,  five 
hundred  copies  were  sold  in  ten  weeks, 
which  broke  all  records  of  that  day.  Mac- 
aulay received  royalties  of  over  $150,000 
on  history,  a  sum  which  would  have  been 

[7] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

trebled  had  he  secured  payment  on  editions 
issued  in  the  United  States,  where  his 
works  were  more  popular  than  in  his  own 
country.  His  last  years  were  crowded  with 
honors.  He  accepted  a  peerage  two  years 
before  his  death.  When  the  end  came  he 
was  given  a  public  funeral  and  a  place  in 
Westminster  Abbey. 

With  Carlyle,Macaulay  shares  the  honor 
of  being  the  greatest  of  English  essayists. 
While  he  cannot  compare  with  Carlyle  in 
insight  into  character  and  in  splendor  of 
imagination,  he  appeals  to  the  wider  audi- 
ence because  of  his  attractive  style,  his 
wealth  of  ornament  and  illustration  and 
his  great  clearness.  Carlyle's  appeal  is 
mainly  to  students,  but  Macaulay  appeals 
to  all  classes  of  readers. 

Macaulay's  style  has  been  imitated  by 
many  hands,  but  no  one  has  ever  worked 
such  miracles  as  he  wrought  with  apparent 
ease.  In  the  first  place,  his  learning  was 
so  much  a  part  of  his  mind  that  he  drew 
on  its  stores  without  effort.  Scarcely  a 
paragraph  can  be  found  in  all  his  essays 
which  is  not  packed  with  allusions,  yet  all 
seem  to  illustrate  his  subject  so  naturally 
that  one  never  looks  upon  them  as  used  to 
display  his  remarkable  knowledge. 

[8] 


MACAULAY'S  ESSAYS  IN  HISTORY 

Macaulay  is  a  master  of  all  the  literary 
arts.  Especially  does  he  love  to  use  an- 
tithesis and  to  make  his  effects  by  violent 
contrasts.  Add  to  this  the  art  of  skilful 
climax,  clever  alliteration,  happy  illustra- 
tion and  great  narrative  power  and  you 
have  the  chief  features  of  Macaulay's  style. 
The  reader  is  carried  along  on  this  flood 
of  oratorical  style,  and  so  great  is  the 
author's  descriptive  power  that  one  actually 
beholds  the  scenes  and  the  personages  which 
he  depicts. 

Of  all  his  essays  Macaulay  shows  his 
great  powers  most  conspicuously  in  those 
on  Milton,  Clive,  Warren  Hastings  and 
Croker's  edition  of  Boswell's  Johnson.  In 
these  he  is  always  the  advocate  laboring  to 
convince  his  hearers;  always  the  orator  filled 
with  that  passion  of  enthusiasm  which 
makes  one  accept  his  words  for  the  time, 
just  as  one's  mind  is  unconsciously  swayed 
by  the  voice  of  an  eloquent  speaker.  It  is 
this  intense  earnestness,  this  fierce  desire  to 
convince,  joined  to  this  prodigal  display  of 
learning,  which  stamps  Macaulay's  words 
on  the  brain  of  the  receptive  reader.  Only 
when  in  cold  blood  we  analyze  his  essays 
do  we  escape  from  this  literary  hypnotism 
which  he  exerts  upon  every  reader. 

[9] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

The  essays  of  Macaulay  are  full  of  meat 
and  all  are  worth  reading,  but,  of  course, 
every  reader  will  differ  in  his  estimate  of 
them  according  to  his  own  tastes  and  sym- 
pathies. It  is  fine  practice  to  take  one  of 
these  essays  and  look  up  the  literary  and 
historical  allusions.  No  more  attractive 
work  than  this  can  be  set  before  a  reading 
club.  It  will  give  rich  returns  in  knowl- 
edge as  well  as  in  methods  of  literary  study. 
Macaulay 's  History  is  not  read  to-day  as  it 
was  twenty  years  ago,  mainly  because  his- 
torical writing  in  these  days  has  suffered  a 
great  change,  due  to  the  growth  of  religious 
and  political  toleration.  Macaulay  is  a 
partisan  and  a  bigot,  but  if  one  can  discount 
much  of  his  bias  and  bitterness  it  will  be 
found  profitable  to  read  portions  of  this 
history.  Macaulay's  verse  is  not  of  a  high 
order,  but  his  Lays  are  full  of  poetic  fire, 
and  they  appeal  to  a  wider  audience  than 
more  finished  verse. 

Of  all  the  English  writers  of  the  last 
century  Macaulay  has  preserved  the  strong- 
est hold  on  the  reading  public,  and  what- 
ever changes  time  may  make  in  literary 
fashions,  one  may  rest  assured  that  Macau- 
lay  will  always  retain  his  grip  on  readers  of 
English  blood. 

[10] 


SCOTT 

AND  His  WAVERLEY 
NOVELS 

THE  GREATEST  NOVELIST  THE  WORLD  HAS 
KNOWN-HE  MADE  HISTORY  REAL  AND 
CREATED  CHARACTERS  THAT  WILL 
NEVER  DIE. 

IT  is  as  difficult  to  sum  up  in  a  brief  article 
the  work  and  the  influence  of  Sir  Walter 
Scott  as  it  is  to  make  an  estimate  of  Shake- 
speare, for  Scott  holds  the  same  position  in 
English  prose  fiction  that  Shakespeare 
holds  in  English  poetry.  In  neither  depart- 
ment is  there  any  rival.  In  sheer  creative 
force  Scott  stands  head  and  shoulders  above 
every  other  English  novelist,  and  he  has 
no  superior  among  the  novelists  of  any 
other  nation.  He  has  made  Scotland  and 
the  Scotch  people  known  to  the  world  as 
Cervantes  made  Spain  and  the  Spaniards 
a  reality  for  all  times. 

But  he  did  more  than  Cervantes,  for  his 
creative  mind  reached  over  the  border  into 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

England  and  across  the  channel  to  France 
and  Germany,  and  even  to  the  Holy  Land, 
and  found  there  historical  types  which  he 
made  as  real  and  as  immortal  as  his  own 
highland  clansmen.  His  was  the  great  cre- 
ative brain  of  the  nineteenth  century,  and 
his  work  has  made  the  world  his  debtor. 
His  work  stimulated  the  best  story  teller 
of  France  and  gave  the  world  Monte  Cristo 
and  'The  Three  Guardsmen.  It  fired  the 
imaginations  of  a  score  of  English  histor- 
ical novelists;  it  was  the  progenitor  of  Wey- 
man's  A  Soldier  of  France  and  Conan 
Doyle's  Micah  Clarke  and  The  White  Com- 
pany. 

Scott's  mind  was  Shakespearean  in  its 
capacity  for  creating  characters  of  real  flesh 
and  blood;  for  making  great  historical  per- 
sonages as  real  and  vital  as  our  next-door 
neighbors,  and  for  bursts  of  sustained  story 
telling  that  carry  the  reader  on  for  scores 
of  pages  without  an  instant's  drop  in  inter- 
est. Only  the  supreme  masters  in  creative 
art  can  accomplish  these  things.  And  the 
wonder  of  it  is  that  Scott  did  all  these 
things  without  effort  and  without  any 
self-consciousness.  We  can  not  imagine 
Scott  bragging  about  any  of  his  books  or 
his  characters,  as  Balzac  did  about  Eugenie 

[12] 


SIR  WALTER  SCOTT 

THIS  PORTRAIT  is  TAKEN  FROM  CHANTREY'S  BUST 
NOW  AT  ABBOTSFORD,  WHICH,  ACCORDING  TO 

LOCKHART,  "ALONE    PRESERVES   FOR    PoS- 

TERITYTHE  EXPRESSION  MOST  FONDLY 

REMEMBERED  BY  ALL  WHO  EVER 

MINGLED  IN  HIS  DOMESTIC 

CIRCLE" 


SCOTT  AND  His  WAVERLEY  NOVELS 

Grandet  and  others  of  his  French  types. 
He  was  too  big  a  man  for  any  small  vani- 
ties. But  he  was  as  human  as  Shakespeare 
in  his  love  of  money,  his  desire  to  gather 
his  friends  about  him  and  his  hearty  enjoy- 
ment of  good  food  and  drink. 

It  has  become  the  fashion  among  some 
of  our  hair-splitting  critics  to  decry  Scott 
because  of  his  carelessness  in  literary  style, 
his  tendency  to  long  introductions,  and  his 
fondness  for  description.  These  critics  will 
tell  you  that  Turgeneff  and  Tolstoi  are 
greater  literary  artists  than  Scott,  just  as 
they  tell  you  that  Thackeray  and  Dickens 
do  not  deserve  a  place  among  the  foremost 
of  English  novelists.  This  petty,  finical 
criticism,  which  would  measure  everything 
by  its  own  rigid  rule  of  literary  art,  loses 
sight  of  the  great  primal  fact  that  Scott 
created  more  real  characters  and  told  more 
good  stories  than  any  other  novelist,  and 
that  his  work  will  outlive  that  of  all  his 
detractors.  It  ignores  the  fact  that  Thack- 
eray's wit,  pathos,  tenderness  and  knowl- 
edge of  human  nature  make  him  immortal 
in  spite  of  many  defects.  It  forgets  that 
Dickens'  humor,  joy  of  living  and  keen 
desire  to  help  his  fellow  man  will  bring 
him  thousands  of  readers  after  all  the 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

apostles  of  realism  are  buried  under  the 
dust  of  oblivion. 

Scott  had  the  ideal  training  for  a  great 
historical  novelist.  Yet  his  literary  suc- 
cesses in  verse  and  prose  were  the  result 
of  accident.  It  is  needless  here  to  review 
his  life.  The  son  of  a  mediocre  Scotch 
lawyer,  he  inherited  from  his  father  his 
capacity  for  work  and  his  passion  for  sys- 
tem and  order.  From  his  mother  he  drew 
his  love  of  reading  and  his  fondness  for 
old  tales  of  the  Scotch  border.  Like  so 
many  famous  writers,  his  early  education 
was  desultory,  but  he  had  the  free  run  of 
a  fine  library,  and  when  he  was  a  mere 
schoolboy  his  reading  of  the  best  English 
classics  had  been  wider  and  more  thorough 
than  that  of  his  teachers. 

Forced  by  boyish  illness  to  live  in  the 
country,  he  early  developed  a  great  love 
for  the  Scotch  ballads  and  the  tales  of  the 
romantic  past  of  his  native  land.  These 
he  gathered  mainly  by  word  of  mouth. 
Later  he  was  a  diligent  student  and  col- 
lector of  all  the  old  ballads.  In  this  way 
his  mind  was  steeped  in  historical  lore, 
while  by  many  walking  tours  through  the 
highlands  he  came  to  know  the  common 
people  as  very  few  have  ever  known  them. 

[H] 


mr* 


SCOTT  AND  His  WAVERLEY  NOVELS 

Thus  for  forty  years,  while  he  was  a 
working  lawyer  and  a  sheriff  of  his  county, 
he  was  really  laying  up  stores  of  material 
upon  which  he  drew  for  his  many  novels. 
His  literary  tastes  were  first  developed  by 
study  of  German  and  by  the  translation 
of  German  ballads  and  plays.  This  prac- 
tice led  him  to  write  The  Lay  of  the  Last 
Minstrel,  and  its  success  was  responsible 
for  Marmion  and  The  Lady  of  the  Lake, 
But  great  as  was  his  triumph  in  verse, 
he  dropped  the  writing  of  poems  when 
Byron's  work  eclipsed  his  own. 

Then,  in  his  forty-third  year,  he  turned 
to  prose  and  began  with  PPaverley;  that 
series  of  novels  which  is  the  greatest  ever 
produced  by  one  man.  The  success  of  his 
first  story  proved  a  great  stimulus  to  his 
imagination,  and  for  years  he  continued  to 
produce  these  novels,  three  of  which  may 
be  ranked  as  the  best  in  English  literature. 
The  element  of  mystery  in  regard  to  the 
authorship  added  to  Scott's  literary  suc- 
cess. It  was  his  habit  to  crowd  his  literary 
work  into  the  early  hours  from  four  to 
eight  o'clock  in  the  morning;  the  remain- 
der of  the  day  was  given  up  to  legal  duties 
and  the  evening  to  society.  His  tremen- 
dous energy  and  his  power  of  concentra- 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

tion  made  these  four  hours  equal  to  an 
ordinary  man's  working  day.  His  mind 
was  so  full  of  material  that  the  labor  was 
mainly  that  of  selection.  Creative  work, 
when  once  seated  at  his  desk,  was  as  nat- 
ural as  breathing.  Scott  came  to  his  desk 
with  the  zest  of  a  boy  starting  on  a  holi- 
day, and  this  pleasure  is  reflected  in  the 
ease  and  spontaneity  of  his  stories. 

But  much  as  he  liked  his  literary  work, 
Scott  would  not  have  produced  so  great  a 
number  of  fine  novels  had  he  not  been 
impelled  by  the  desire  to  retrieve  large 
money  losses.  His  old  school  friend, 
Ballantyne,  forced  into  bankruptcy  the 
printing  firm  in  which  Scott  was  a  secret 
partner.  The  novelist  was  not  morally 
responsible  for  these  debts,  but  his  keen 
sense  of  honor  made  him  accept  all  the 
responsibility,  and  it  drove  him  to  that 
unceasing  work  which  shortened  his  life. 
He  paid  off  nearly  all  the  great  debt,  and 
he  gave  in  this  task  an  example  of  high 
courage  and  power  of  work  that  has  never 
been  surpassed  and  seldom  equaled.  Yor 
may  read  the  record  of  those  last  years  in 
Lockhart's  fine  Life  of  Scott.  Get  the  one 
volume  edition,  for  the  full  work  is  too 
long  for  these  busy  days,  and  follow  ths 

[16] 


SCOTT  AND  His  WAVERLEY  NOVELS 

old  author  in  his  heroic  struggle.  It  will 
bring  tears  to  your  eyes,  but  it  will  make 
you  a  lover  of  Scott,  the  man,  who  was  as 
great  as  Scott,  the  poet  and  novelist. 

Ruskin,  when  he  was  making  up  a  list 
of  great  authors,  put  opposite  Scott's  name, 
"Every  line."  That  bit  of  advice  cannot 
be  followed  in  these  strenuous  times,  but 
one  must  make  a  selection  of  the  best,  and 
then,  if  he  have  time  and  inclination,  add 
to  this  number.  To  my  mind,  the  four 
great  novels  of  Scott  are  Ivanhoe,  Quentin 
Durward,  The  Talisman  and  The  Heart  of 
Midlothian.  The  first  gives  you  feudal 
England  as  no  one  else  has  painted  it, 
withapi6ture  of  Richard  the  Lion-Hearted 
which  no  historian  has  ever  approached. 
It  contains  some  of  the  most  thrilling 
scenes  in  all  fiction. 

James  Payn,  who  was  a  very  clever 
novelist,  relates  the  story  that  he  and  two 
literary  friends  agreed  to  name  the  scene 
in  all  fiction  that  they  regarded  as  the 
most  dramatic.  When  they  came  to  com- 
pare notes  they  found  that  all  three  had 
chosen  the  same— the  entry  of  the  unknown 
knight  at  Ashby  de  la  Zouch,  who  passes 
by  the  tents  of  the  other  contestants  and 
strikes  with  a  resounding  clash  the  shield 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

of  the  haughty  Templar.  This  romance 
also  contains  one  of  Scott's  finest  women, 
the  Jewess  Rebecca,  who  atones  for  the 
novelist's  many  insipid  female  characters. 
Scott  was  much  like  Stevenson— he  pre- 
ferred to  draw  men,  and  he  was  happiest 
when  in  the  clash  of  arms  or  about  to 
undertake  a  desperate  adventure. 

^uentin  Durward  is  memorable  for  its 
splendid  piclure  of  Louis  XI,  one  of 
the  ablest  as  well  as  one  of  the  mean- 
est men  who  ever  sat  on  a  throne.  The 
early  chapters  of  this  novel,  which  describe 
the  adventures  of  the  young  Scotch 
soldier  at  the  court  of  France,  have  never 
been  surpassed  in  romantic  interest.  The 
Talisman  gives  the  glory  and  the  romance 

of  the  Crusades  as  no  other  imaginative 

o 

work  has  done.  It  stands  in  a  class  by 
itself  and  is  only  approached  by  Scott's 
last  novel,  Count  Robert  of  Paris,  which 
gives  flashes  of  the  same  spirit. 

Of  the  Scotch  novels  it  is  difficult  to 
make  a  choice,  but  it  seems  to  me  The 
Heart  of  Midlothian  has  the  widest  appeal, 
although  many  would  cast  their  votes  for 
Old  Mortality,  The  Antiquary  or  Rob  Roy 
because  of  the  rich  humor  of  thoseromances. 
Scott's  dialecl,  although  true  to  nature,  is 

[18] 


SCOTT  AND  His  WAVERLEY  NOVELS 

not  difficult,  as  he  did  not  consider  it  neces- 
sary to  give  all  the  colloquial  terms,  like 
the  modern  "kailyard"  writers. 

If  you  read  three  or  four  of  Scott's  novels 
you  are  pretty  apt  to  read  more.  It  is  an 
easy  matter  to  skip  the  prolix  passages  and 
the  unnecessary  introductions.  This  done, 
you  have  a  body  of  romance  that  is  far 
richer  than  any  present-day  fiction.  And 
their  great  merit  is  that,  though  written  in 
a  coarse  age,  the  Waverley  novels  are  sweet 
and  wholesome.  One  misses  a  great  source 
of  enjoyment  and  culture  who  fails  to  read 
the  best  of  Scott's  novels.  Take  them  all 
in  all,  they  are  the  finest  fiction  that  has 
ever  been  written, and  their  continued  popu- 
larity, despite  their  many  faults,  is  the  best 
proof  of  their  sterling  merit. 


CARLYLE 

As  AN  INSPIRER 

OF  YOUTH 

THE  FINEST  ENGLISH  PROSE  WRITER  OF 

THE  LAST  CENTURY— His  BEST  BOOKS, 

"PAST  AND  PRESENT,"  "SARTOR  RESAR- 

TUS"AND  THE  "FRENCH  REVOLUTION." 

A;  an  influence  in  stimulating  school  and 
college  students,  Macaulay  must  be 
given  a  foremost  place,  but  greater  than 
Macaulay,  because  of  his  spiritual  fervor 
and  his  moral  force,  stands  Thomas  Carlyle, 
the  great  prophet  and  preacher  of  the  nine- 
teenth century,  whose  influence  will  outlast 
that  of  all  other  writers  of  his  time.  And 
this  spiritual  potency,  which  resides  in  his 
best  work,  is  not  weakened  by  his  love  of 
the  Strong  Man  in  History  or  his  fear  of 
the  rising  tide  of  popular  democracy,  in 
which  he  saw  a  dreadful  repetition  of  the 
horrors  of  the  French  Revolution.  It  was 
the  Puritan  element  in  his  granite  character 

[20J 


THOMAS  CARI.YLE 

FROM  THE  WORLD-FAMED  MASTERPIECE  OF 
PORTRAITURE  BY  JAMES 
WHISTLER 


CARLYLE  As  AN  INSPIRER  OF  YOUTH 

which  gave  most  of  the  flaming  spiritual 
ardor  to  Carlyle's  work.  It  was  this  which 
made  him  the  greatest  preacher  of  his  day, 
although  he  had  left  behind  him  all  the 
old  articles  of  faith  for  which  his  forefathers 
went  cheerfully  to  death  on  many  a  bloody 
field. 

Carlyle  believed  a  strong  religious  faith 
was  vital  to  any  real  and  lasting  work  in 
this  world,  and  from  the  day  he  gave  out 
Sartor  Kesartus  he  preached  this  doctrine  in 
all  his  books.  He  was  born  into  a  genera- 
tion that  was  content  to  accept  the  forms 
of  religion,  so  long  as  it  could  enjoy  the 
good  things  of  this  world,  and  much  of 
Carlyle's  speech  sounded  to  the  people  of 
his  day  like  the  warnings  of  the  prophet 
Isaiah  to  the  Israelites  of  old.  But  Carlyle 
was  never  daunted  by  lack  of  appreciation 
or  by  any  ridicule  or  abuse.  These  only 
made  him  more  confident  in  his  belief  that 
the  spiritual  life  is  the  greatest  thing  in 
this  world.  And  he  actually  lived  the  life 
that  he  preached. 

For  years  Carlyle  failed  to  make  enough 
to  support  himself  and  his  wife,  yet  he 
refused  a  large  income,  offered  by  the  LON- 
DONTiMES  for  editorial  work,on  theground 
that  he  could  not  write  to  order  nor  bend 

[21] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

his  opinions  to  those  of  others.  He  put 
behind  him  the  temptation  to  take  advan- 
tage of  great  fame  when  it  suddenly  came 
to  him.  When  publishers  were  eager  for 
his  work  he  spent  the  same  time  in  pre- 
paring his  books  as  when  he  was  poor  and 
unsought.  He  labored  at  the  smallest 
task  to  give  the  best  that  was  in  him;  he 
wrote  much  of  his  work  in  his  heart's 
blood.  Hence  it  is  that  through  all  of  his 
books,  but  especially  through  Past  and 
Present  and  Heroes  and  Hero  Worship, one. 
feels  the  strong  beat  of  the  heart  of  this 
great  man,  who  yearned  to  make  others 
follow  the  spiritual  life  that  he  had  found 
so  full  of  strength  and  comfort. 

Carlyle's  life  was  largely  one  of  work 
and  self-denial.  He  was  born  of  poor  par- 
ents at  the  little  village  of  Ecclefechan, 
in  Dumfriesshire,  Scotland.  His  father, 
though  an  uneducated  stone-mason,  was  a 
man  of  great  mental  force  and  originality, 
while  his  mother  was  a  woman  of  fine 
imagination,  with  a  large  gift  of  story  tell- 
ing. The  boy  received  the  groundwork 
of  a  good  education  and  then  walked  eighty 
miles  to  Edinburgh  University.  Born  in 
1 795,  Carlyle  went  to  Edinburgh  in  I  809. 
His  painful  economy  at  college  laid  the 

[22] 


CARLYLE  As  AN  INSPIRER  OF  YOUTH 

foundation  of  the  dyspepsia  which  troubled 
him  all  his  days,  hampered  his  work  and 
made  him  take  a  gloomy  view  of  life.  At 
Edinburgh  he  made  a  specialty  of  mathe- 
matics and  German.  He  remained  at  the 
university  five  years. 

The  next  fifteen  years  were  spent  in 
tutoring,  hack  writing  for  the  publishers 
and  translation  from  the  German.  His 
first  remunerative  work  was  the  translation 
of  Goethe's  Wilhelm  Meister,  a  version 
which  still  remains  the  best  in  English. 
After  his  marriage  to  Jane  Welsh  he  was 
driven  by  poverty  to  take  refuge  on  his 
wife's  lonely  farm  at  Craigenputtock,  where 
he  did  much  reading  and  wrote  the  early 
essays  which  contain  some  of  his  best  work. 
The  EDINBURGH  REVIEW  and  ERASER'S 
were  opened  to  him. 

Finally,  in  1833,  wnen  he  was  nearly 
forty  years  old,  he  made  his  first  literary 
hit  with  Sartor  Resartus,  which  called  out 
a  storm  of  caustic  criticism.  The  Germanic 
style,  the  elephantine  humor,  the  strange 
conceits  and  the  sledge-hammer  blows  at 
all  which  the  smug  English  public  regarded 
with  reverence— all  these  features  aroused 
irritation.  Four  years  later  came  The  French 
Re  volution, which  established  Carlyle's  fame 

[23] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

as  one  of  the  greatest  of  English  writers. 
From  this  time  on  he  was  freed  from  the 
fear  of  poverty,  but  it  was  only  in  his  last 
years,  when  he  needed  little,  that  he 
enjoyed  an  income  worthy  of  his  labors. 

Carlyle's  great  books, beside  those  I  have 
mentioned,  are  the  lives  of  Cromwell  and 
of  Frederick  the  Great.  These  are  too  long 
for  general  reading,  but  a  single  volume 
condensation  of  the  Frederick  gives  a  good 
idea  of  Carlyle's  method  of  combining 
biography  and  history.  Carlyle  outlived 
all  his  contemporaries— a  lonely  old  man, 
full  of  bitter  remorse  over  imaginary  neg- 
lect of  his  wife,  and  full  also  of  despair 
over  the  democratic  tendencies  of  the  age, 
which  he  regarded  as  the  outward  signs  of 

national  degeneracv. 
o  . 

Carlyle's  fame  was  clouded  thirty  years 
ago  by  the  unwise  publication  of  reminis- 
cences and  letters  which  he  never  intended 
for  print.  Froude  was  chosen  as  his  biog- 
rapher. One  of  the  great  masters  of  Eng- 
lish, Froude  was  a  bachelor  who  idealized 
Mrs.  Carlyle  and  who  regarded  as  the 
simple  truth  an  old  man's  bitter  regrets 
over  opportunities  neglected  to  make  his 
wife  happier.  Everyone  who  has  studied 
Carlyle's  life  knows  that  he  was  dogmatic, 

[24] 


CARLYLE  As  AN  INSPIRER  OF  YOUTH 

dyspeptic,  irritable,  and  given  to  sharp 
speech  even  against  those  he  loved  the 
best.  But  over  against  these  failings  must 
be  placed  his  tenderness,  his  unfaltering 
affection,  his  self-denial,  his  tremendous 
labors,  his  small  rewards. 

When  separated  from  his  wife  Carlyle 
wrote  her  letters  that  are  like  those  of  a 
young  lover,  an  infinite  tenderness  in  every 
line.  One  of  her  great  crosses  was  the 
belief  that  her  husband  was  in  love  with 
the  brilliant  Lady  Ashburton.  Her  jeal- 
ousy was  absurd,  as  this  great  lady  invited 
Carlyle  to  her  dinners  because  he  was  the 
most  brilliant  talker  in  all  England,  and 
he  accepted  because  the  opportunity  to 
indulge  in  monologue  to  appreciative  hear- 
ers was  a  keener  pleasure  to  him  than  to 
write  eloquent  warnings  to  his  day  and 
generation.  Froude's  unhappy  book,  with 
a  small  library  of  commentary  that  it  called 
forth,  is  practically  forgotten,  but  Carlyle's 
fame  and  his  books  endure  because  they 
are  real  and  not  founded  on  illusion. 

Carlyle  opens  a  new  world  to  the  col- 
lege student  or  the  ambitious  youth  who 
may  be  gaining  an  education  by  his  own 
efforts.  He  sounds  a  note  that  is  found  in 
no  other  author  of  our  time.  Doubtless 

[25] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

some  of  this  attraction  is  due  to  his  singu- 
lar style,  formed  on  a  long  study  of  the 
German,  but  most  of  it  is  due  to  the  tre- 
mendous earnestness  of  the  man,  which 
lays  hold  of  the  young  reader.  Never  shall 
I  forget  when  in  college  preparatory  days 
I  devoured  Past  and  Present  and  was  stirred 
to  extra  effort  by  its  trumpet  calls  that 
work  is  worship  and  that  the  night  soon 
cometh  when  no  man  can  work. 

His  fine  chapter  on  Labor,  with  its  splen- 
did version  of  the  Mason  s  Song  of  Goethe 
has  stimulated  thousands  to  take  up  heavy 
burdens  and  go  on  with  the  struggle  for 
that  culture  of  the  mind  and  the  soul  which 
is  the  more  precious  the  harder  the  fight 
to  secure  it.  I  remember  copying  in  a 
commonplace  book  some  of  Carlyle's  son- 
orous passages  that  stir  the  blood  of  the 
young  like  a  bugle  call  to  arms.  Reading 

them   over  years  after,  I  am  glad  to  say 
.  *•'     •  • 

that  they  still  appealed  to  me,  for  it  seems 

to  me  that  the  saddest  thing  in  this  world 
is  to  lose  one's  youthful  enthusiasms.  When 
you  can  keep  these  fresh  and  strong,  after 
years  of  contact  with  a  selfish  world,  age 
cannot  touch  you. 

In  this  appeal  to  all  that  is  best  and 
noblest  in  youth,  Carlyle  stands  unrivaled. 


• 


ARCHHOUSE,  ECCLEFECHAN,  DUMFRIESSHIRE 

THE  BIRTHPLACE  OF  THOMAS  CARLYLE— FROM  A 

PHOTOGRAPH  IN  THE  POSSESSION  OF  ALEXANDER 

CARLYLE,  M .  A.  ON  WHICH  CARLYLE  HAS 

WRITTEN  A  MEMORANDUM  TO  SHOW 

IN  WHICH  ROOM  HE  WAS  BORN 


CARLYLE  As  AN  INSPIRER  OF  YOUTH 

He  has  far  more  heart,  force  and  real  warm 
blood  than  Emerson,  who  saw  just  as 
clearly,  but  who  could  not  make  his  thought 
reach  the  reader.  A  course  in  Carlyle 
should  be  compulsory  in  the  freshman 
year  at  every  college.  If  the  lecturer  were 
a  man  still  full  of  his  early  enthusiasms  it 
could  not  fail  to  have  rich  results.  Take, 
for  instance,  those  two  chapters  in  Past 
and  Present  that  are  entitled  "Happy"  and 
"Labor."  In  a  dozen  pages  are  summed 
up  all  Carlyle's  creed.  In  these  pages  he 
declares  that  the  only  enduring  happiness 
is  found  in  good,  honest  work,  done  with 
all  a  man's  heart  and  soul.  And  after 
caustic  words  on  the  modern  craving  for 
happiness  he  ends  a  noble  diatribe  with 
these  words,  which  are  worth  framing  and 
hanging  on  the  wall,  where  they  may  be 
studied  day  by  day: 

Brief  brawling  Day,  with  its  noisy  phantasms,  its 
poor  paper-crown's  tinsel-gilt  is  gone;  and  divine 
everlasting  Night,  with  her  star-diadems,  with  her 
silences  and  her  veracities,  is  come!  What  hast  thou 
done,  and  how?  Happiness,  unhappiness;  all  that  was 
but  wages  thou  hadst;  thou  hast  spent  all  that,  in  sus- 
taining thyself  hitherward;  not  a  coin  of  it  remains 
with  thee ;  it  is  all  spent,  eaten ;  and  now  thy  work, 
where  is  thy  work?  Swift,  out  with  it;  let  us  see  thy 
work ! 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

Sartor  Resartus  is  very  hard  reading,  but 
if  you  make  up  your  mind  to  go  through 
it  you  will  be  repaid  by  many  fine  thoughts 
and  many  noble  passages  of  impassioned 
prose.  Under  the  guise  of  Herr  Diogenes 
Teufelsdrockh,  Carlyle  tells  the  story  of 
his  early  religious  doubts,  his  painful  strug- 
gles that  recall  Bunyan's  wrestlings  with 
despair,  and  his  final  entry  upon  a  new 
spiritual  life.  He  wrote  to  let  others  know 
how  he  had  emerged  from  the  Valley  of 
the  Shadow  of  Pessimism  into  the  delect- 
able  Mountains  of  Faith.  Carlyle  was  the 
first  of  his  day  to  proclaim  the  great  truth 
that  the  spiritual  life  is  far  more  important 
than  the  material  life,  and  this  he  showed 
by  the  humorous  philosophy  of  clothes, 
which  he  unfolded  in  the  style  of  the  Ger- 
man pedants.  Carlyle  evidently  took  great 
pleasure  in  developing  this  satire  on  Ger- 
man philosophy,  which  is  full  of  broad 
humor. 

The  French  Revolution  has  been  aptly 
called  "history  by  lightning  flashes."  One 
needs  to  have  a  good  general  idea  of  the 
period  before  reading  Carlyle'swork.  Then 
he  can  enjoy  this  series  of  splendid  pictures 
of  the  upheaval  of  the  nether  world  and 
the  strange  moral  monsters  that  sated  their 


CARLYLE  As  AN  INSPIRER  OF  YOUTH 

lust  for  blood  and  power  in  those  evil  days, 
which  witnessed  the  terrible  payment  of 
debts  of  selfish  monarchy.  Carlyle  reaches 
the  height  of  his  power  in  this  book,  which 
may  be  read  many  times  with  profit. 

The  sources  of  Carlyle's  strength  as  a 
writer  are  his  moral  and  spiritual  fervor 
and  his  power  of  making  the  reader  see 
what  he  sees.  The  first  insures  him  endur- 
ing fame,  as  it  makes  what  he  wrote  eighty 
years  ago  as  fresh  and  as  full  of  fine  stim- 
ulus as  though  it  were  written  yesterday. 
The  other  faculty  was  born  in  him.  He 
had  an  eye  for  pictures;  he  described  what 
he  saw  down  to  the  minutest  detail;  he 
made  the  men  of  the  French  Revolution 
as  real  as  the  people  he  met  on  his  tour  of 
Ireland.  He  made  Cromwell  and  Frederick 
men  of  blood  and  iron,  not  mere  historical 
lay  figures.  And  over  all  he  cast  the  glam- 
our of  his  own  indomitable  spirit,  which 
makes  life  look  good  even  to  the  man  who 
feels  the  pinch  of  poverty  and  whose  out- 
look is  dreary.  You  can't  keep  down  the 
boy  who  makes  Carlyle  his  daily  compan- 
ion; he  will  rise  by  very  force  of  fighting 
spirit  of  this  dour  old  Scotchman. 


DE  QUINCEY 

As  A  MASTER  OF 

STYLE 

HE  WROTE  "CONFESSIONS  OF  AN  ENGLISH 
OPIUM-EATER-DREAMED  DREAMS  AND 
SAW  VISIONS  AND  PICTURED  THEM  IN 
POETIC  PROSE. 

OF  all  the  English  writers  Thomas  De 
Quincey  must  be  given  the  palm  for 
rhythmical  prose.  He  is  as  stately  as  Mil- 
ton, with  more  than  Milton's  command  of 
rhythm.  If  you  read  aloud  his  best  pas- 
sages, which  are  written  in  what  he  calls 
his  bravura  style,  you  have  a  near  approach 
to  the  music  of  the  organ.  De  Quincey 
was  so  nice  a  judge  of  words,  he  knew  so 
well  how  to  balance  his  periods,  that  one 
of  his  sentences  gives  to  the  appreciative 
ear  the  same  delight  as  a  stanza  of  perfect 
verse. 

Ruskin  had  much  of  De  Quincey's  com- 
mand of  impassioned  prose,  but  he  never 
rose  to  the  same  sustained  heights  as  the 

[3°] 


THOMAS  DE  QUINCEV 
FROM  AN  OLD  ENGRAVING 


DE  QUINCEY  As  A  MASTER  OF  STYLE 

older  author.  In  fad:,  De  Quincey  stands 
alone  in  these  traits:  the  mass  and  accuracy 
of  his  accumulated  knowledge;  the  power 
of  making  the  finest  distinctions  clear  to 
any  reader,  and  the  gorgeous  style,  thick 
with  the  embroidery  of  poetical  figures, 
yet  never  giving  the  impression  of  over- 
adornment.  And  above  all  these  merits  is 
the  supreme  charm  of  melodious,  rhyth- 
mical sentences,  which  give  the  same  enjoy- 
ment as  fine  music. 

Forty  years  ago  De  Quincey's  Confessions 
of  an  English  Opium-Rater  was  read  by 
everyone  who  professed  any  knowledge  of 
the  masters  of  English  literature.  To-day 
it  is  voted  old-fashioned,  and  few  are  famil- 
iar with  its  splendid  imagery.  His  other 
works,  which  fill  over  a  dozen  volumes, 
are  practically  forgotten,  mainly  because 
his  style  is  very  diffuse  and  his  constant 
digressions  weary  the  reader  who  has  small 
leisure  for  books. 

No  one,  however,  should  miss  reading 
the  Confessions^  the  Autobiography  and  some 
one  essay,  such,  for  instance,  as  "Murder 
as  One  of  the  Fine  Arts,"  or  "The  Flight 
of  a  Tartar  Tribe,"  or  "The  Vision  of  Sud- 
den Death"  in  An  English  Mail  Coach.  All 
these  contain  passages  of  the  greatest  beauty 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

buried  in  prolix  descriptions.  The  reader 
must  be  warned  not  to  drop  De  Quincey 
because  of  his  digressions.  With  a  little 
practice  you  may  skip  those  which  do  not 
appeal  to  you,  and  there  is  ample  sweetness 
at  the  heart  of  his  work  to  repay  one  for 
removing  a  large  amount  of  husk. 

De  Quincey  has  always  impressed  me  as 
a  fine  example  of  the  defects  of  the  English 
school  and  college  training.  Although  he 
could  write  and  speak  Greek  fluently  at 
thirteen,  and  although  he  had  equally  per- 
fect command  of  Latin  and  German,  he 
was  absolutely  untrained  in  the  use  of  his 
knowledge  and  he  knew  no  more  about 
real  life  when  he  came  out  of  college  than 
the  average  American  boy  often.  With  a 
splendid  scholarly  equipment  at  seventeen, 
when  thrown  upon  his  own  resources  in 

London,  he  came  to  the  verge  of  starvation, 

.       " 

and  laid  the  seeds  of  disease  of  the  stom- 
ach, which  afterward  drove  him  to  the  use 
of  opium. 

All  his  training  was  purely  theoretical; 
in  the  practical  affairs  of  life  he  remained 
to  the  day  of  his  death  a  mere  child.  As 
he  says  in  his  Confessions,  he  could  have 
earned  a  good  living  as  a  corrector  of 
Greek  proofs  in  any  big  London  pub- 

[32] 


DE  QUINCEY  As  A  MASTER  OF  STYLE 

lishing  house,  but  it  never  occurred  to  his 
schoolboy  mind  that  his  mastery  of  this 
difficult  classical  language  was  of  any  prac- 
tical value.  In  our  day  De  Quincey  would 
have  been  the  greatest  magazinist  of  the 
age,  because  his  best  work  was  in  the  short 
essay;  but  it  is  to  be  feared  that  the  pub- 
lishers of  his  time  fattened  on  the  good 
things  which  he  produced  and  gave  small 
sums  to  the  man  who  turned  out  these 
masterpieces  with  so  little  effort. 

De  Quincey  was  born  in  1785  and  died 
in  1859.  His  life  was  peculiar  and  its  facts 
became  very  well  known  even  in  his  own 
time  because  in  his  Autobiography  and  his 
Confessions  he  disclosed  its  details  with  the 
frankness  of  a  child.  These  works  are  sur- 
charged with  some  exaggeration,  but  in  the 
main  they  ring  true.  As  precocious  as 
Macaulay,  he  had  much  of  that  author's 
fondness  for  books,  and  when  he  first 
went  to  public  school  at  eleven  years  of 
age  he  had  read  as  much  as  most  men  when 
they  take  a  college  degree.  His  mind 
absorbed  languages  without  effort.  At  fif- 
teen he  could  write  Greek  verse,  and  his 
tutor  once  remarked,  "That  boy  could 
harangue  an  Athenian  mob  better  than  you 
or  I  could  address  an  English  one." 

[33J 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

He  lost  his  father  at  the  age  of  seven,  and 
his  mother  seems  to  have  given  little  per- 
sonal attention  to  him.  He  was  in  nominal 
charge  of  four  guardians,  and  at  seventeen, 
when  his  health  had  been  seriously  reduced 
by  lack  of  exercise  and  overdosing  of  medi- 
cines, the  sensitive  boy  ran  away  from  the 
Manchester  Grammar  school  and  wandered 
for  several  months  in  Wales.  He  was 
allowed  a  pound  a  week  by  one  of  his 
guardians,  and  he  made  shift  with  this  for 
months;  but  finally  the  hunger  for  books, 
which  he  had  no  money  to  buy,  sent  him 
to  London.  There  he  undertook  to  get 
advances  from  money-lenders  on  his  expec- 
tations. This  would  have  been  easy,  as  he 
was  left  a  substantial  income  in  his  father's 
will,  but  these  Shylocks  kept  the  boy 
waiting. 

In  his  Confessions  he  tells  of  his  suffer- 
ings from  want  of  food,  of  his  nights  in 
an  unfurnished  house  in  Soho  with  a  little 
girl  who  was  the  "slavey"  of  a  disreputable 
lawyer,  of  his  wanderings  in  the  streets,  of 
the  saving  of  his  life  by  an  outcast  woman 
whom  he  has  immortalized  in  the  most  elo- 
quent passages  of  the  book.  Finally,  he  was 
restored  to  his  friends  and  went  to  Oxford. 
His  mental  independence  prevented  him 

[34] 


• 


DE  QUINCEY  WITH  Two  DAUGHTERS 

AND  GRANDCHILD— FROM  A  CHALK  DRAWING 

BY  JAMES  ARCHER,  R.  S.  A. 

MADE  IN  1855. 


DE  QUINCEY  As  A  MASTER  OF  STYLE 

from  taking  a  degree,  and  chronic  neuralgia 
of  the  face  and  teeth  led  him  to  form  the 
habit  of  taking  opium,  which  clung  to  him 
for  life. 

De  Quincey  was  a  close  associate  of  Col- 
eridge, Wordsworth,  Southey,  Lamb  and 
others.  He  was  a  brilliant  talker,  especially 
when  stimulated  with  opium,  but  he  was 
incapable  of  sustained  intellectual  work. 
Hence  all  his  essays  and  other  work  first 
appeared  in  periodicals  and  were  then  pub- 
lished in  book  form.  It  is  noteworthy  that 
an  American  publisher  was  the  first  to 
gather  his  essays  in  book  form,  and  that 
his  first  appreciation,  like  that  of  Carlyle, 
came  from  this  country. 

Much  of  De  Quincey's  work  is  now 
unreadable  because  it  deals  with  political 
economy  and  allied  subjects,  in  which  he 
fancied  he  was  an  expert.  He  is  a  master 
only  when  he  deals  with  pure  literature, 
but  he  has  a  large  vein  of  satiric  humor 
that  found  its  best  expression  in  the  gro- 
tesque irony  of  "Murder  as  One  of  the 
Fine  Arts."  In  this  essay  he  descants  on 
the  greatest  crime  as  though  it  were  an 
accomplishment,  and  his  freakish  wit  makes 
this  paper  as  enjoyable  as  Charles  Lamb's 
essay  on  the  origin  of  roast  pig. 

[35] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

De  Quincey's  fame,  however,  rests  upon 

'The  Confessions  of  an  English  Opium-Eater. 
This  is  a  record  unique  in  English  litera- 
ture. It  tells  in  De  Quincey's  usual  style, 
with  many  tedious  digressions,  the  story  of 
his  neglected  boyhood,  his  revolt  at  school 
discipline  andmonotony  that  had  shattered 
his  health,  his  wanderings  in  Wales,  his  life 
as  a  common  vagrant  in  London,  his  college 
life,  his  introduction  to  opium  and  the 
dreams  that  came  with  indulgence  in  the 
drug.  The  gorgeous  beauty  of  DeQuincey's 
pictures  of  these  opium  visions  has  prob- 
ably induced  many  susceptible  readers  to 
make  a  trial  of  the  drug,  with  deep  dis- 
appointment as  the  result.  No  common 
mind  can  hope  to  have  such  visions  as  De 
Ouincey  records. 

His  imagination  has  well  been  called 
Druidic;  it  played  about  the  great  facts  and 
personages  of  history  and  it  invested  these 
with  a  background  of  the  most  solemn  and 
imposing  natural  features.  These  dreams 
came  to  have  with  him  the  very  semblance 
of  reality.  Read  the  terrible  passages  in 
the  Confessions  in  which  the  Malay  figures; 
read  the  dream  fugues  in  "Suspira,"  the 
visions  seen  by  the  boy  when  he  looked 
on  his  dead  sister's  face,  or  the  noble  pas- 

[36] 


DE  QUINCEY  As  A  MASTER  OF  STYLE 

sages  that  picture  the  three  Ladies  of  Sor- 
row. Here  is  a  passage  on  the  vision  of 
eternity  at  his  sister's  death  bier,  which 
gives  a  good  idea  of  De  Quincey's  style: 

Whilst  I  stood,  a  solemn  wind  began  to  blow— the 
saddest  that  ear  ever  heard.  It  was  a  wind  that  might 
have  swept  the  fields  of  mortality  for  a  thousand  cen- 
turies. Many  times  since  upon  summer  days,  when  the 
sun  is  about  the  hottest,  I  have  remarked  the  same 
wind  arising  and  uttering  the  same  hollow,  solemn, 
Memnonian,  but  saintly  swell;  it  is  in  this  world  the 
one  great  audible  symbol  of  eternity. 

It  is  a  great  temptation  to  quote  some 
of  De  Quincey's  fine  passages,  but  most  of 
them  are  so  interwoven  with  the  context 
that  the  most  eloquent  bits  cannot  be  taken 
out  without  the  loss  of  their  beauty.  De 
Quincey  was  a  dreamer  before  he  became 
a  slave  to  opium.  This  drug  intensified  a 
natural  tendency  until  he  became  a  vision- 
ary without  an  equal  in  English  literature. 
And  these  visions,  evoked  by  his  splendid 
imagination,  are  worth  reading  in  these 
days  as  an  antidote  to  the  materialism  of 
present-day  life;  they  demonstrate  the 
power  of  the  spiritual  life,  which  is  the 
potent  and  abiding  force  in  all  literature. 


[37] 


CHARLES  LAMB 

AND  THE  ESSAYS  OF 

ELIA 

THE  BEST  BELOVED  OF  ALL  THE  ENGLISH 
WRITERS— QUAINTEST  AND  TENDEREST 
ESSAYIST  WHOSE  WORK  APPEALS  TO 

ALL  HEARTS. 

OF  all  the  English  writers  of  the  last 
century  none  is  so  well  beloved  as 
Charles  Lamb.  Thirty  years  ago  his  Essays 
of  Elia  was  a  book  which  every  one  with 
any  claim  to  culture  had  not  only  read, 
but  read  many  times.  It  was  the  traveling 
companion  and  the  familiar  friend,  the 
unfailing  resource  in  periods  of  depression, 
the  comforter  in  time  of  trouble.  It  touched 
many  experiences  of  life,  and  it  ranged 
from  sunny,  spontaneous  humor  to  that 
pathos  which  is  too  deep  for  tears.  Into  it 
Lamb  put  all  that  was  rarest  and  best  in 
his  nature,  all  that  he  had  gleaned  from  a 
life  of  self-sacrifice  and  spiritual  culture. 

[38] 


CHARLES  LAMB 

FROM  THE  PORTRAIT  BY 

WILLIAM  HAZLITT 


CHARLES  LAMB  AND  ESSAYS  OF  ELIA 

Such  men  as  he  were  rare  in  his  day,  and 
not  understood  by  the  literary  men  of 
harder  nature  who  criticised  his  peculiari- 
ties and  failed  to  appreciate  the  delicacy 
of  his  genius.  Only  one  such  has  appeared 
in  our  time— he  who  has  given  us  a  look 
into  his  heart  in  A  Window  in  thrums  and 
in  that  beautiful  tribute  to  his  mother, 
Margaret  Ogi/vie.  Barrie,  in  his  insight 
into  the  mind  of  a  child  and  in  his  freakish 
fancy  that  seems  brought  over  from  the 
world  of  fairyland  to  lend  its  glamour  to 
prosaic  life,  is  the  only  successor  to  Lamb. 

Lamb  can  endure  this  neglect,  for  were 
he  able  to  revisit  this  earth  no  one  would 
touch  more  whimsically  than  he  upon  the 
fads  and  the  foibles  of  contemporary  life; 
but  it's  a  great  pity  that  in  the  popular 
craze  about  the  new  writers,  all  redolent  with 
the  varnish  of  novelty,  we  should  consign 
to  the  dust  of  unused  shelves  the  wrorks 
of  Charles  Lamb.  All  that  he  wrote  which 
the  world  remembers  is  in  Elia  and  his 
many  letters— those  incomparable  epistles 
in  which  he  quizzed  his  friends  and  revealed 
the  tenderness  of  his  nature  and  the  deli- 
cacy of  his  fancy. 

Robert  Louis  Stevenson  is  justly  re- 
garded as  the  greatest  essayist  of  our  time, 

[39] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

but  I  would  not  exchange  the  Essays  of 
Elia  for  the  best  things  of  the  author  of 
Virginibus  Puerisque.  Stevenson  always, 
except  in  his  familiar  early  letters,  suggests 
the  literary  artist  who  has  revised  his  first 
draft,  with  an  eye  fixed  on  the  world  of 
readers  who  will  follow  him  when  he  is 
gone.  But  Lamb  always  wrote  with  that 
charming  spontaneous  grace  that  comes 
from  a  mind  saturated  with  the  best  read- 
ing and  mellow  with  much  thought.  You 
fancy  him  jotting  down  his  thoughts,  with 
his  quizzical  smile  at  the  effect  of  his  quips 
and  cranks.  You  cannot  figure  him  as 
laboriously  searching  for  the  right  word  or 
painfully  recasting  the  same  sentence  many 
times  until  he  reached  the  form  which 
suited  his  finical  taste.  This  was  Steven- 
son's method,  and  it  leaves  much  of  his 
work  with  the  smell  of  the  lamp  upon  it. 
Lamb  apparently  wrote  for  the  mere  pleas- 
ure of  putting  his  thoughts  in  form,  just 
as  he  talked  when  his  stammering  tongue 
had  been  eased  with  a  little  good  old  wine. 
It  is  idle  to  expect  another  Lamb  in  our 
strenuous  modern  life,  so  we  should  make 
the  most  of  this  quaint  Englishman  of  the 
early  part  of  the  last  century,  who  seemed 
to  bring  over  into  an  artificial  age  all  the 

[40] 


CHARLES  LAMB  AND  ESSAYS  OF  ELIA 

dewy  freshness  of  fancy  of  the  old  Eliza- 
bethan worthies.  Can  anything  be  more 
perfect  in  its  pathos  than  his  essay  on 
"Dream  Children,"  the  tender  fancy  of  a 
bachelor  whom  hard  fate  robbed  of  the 
domestic  joys  that  would  have  made  life 
beautiful  for  him?  Can  anything  be  more 
full  of  fun  than  his  "Dissertation  on  Roast 
Pig,"  or  his  "Mrs.  Battle's  Opinion  on 
Whist"?  His  style  fitted  his  thought  like 
a  elove;  about  it  is  the  aroma  of  an  earlier 

O 

age  when  men  and  women  opened  their 
hearts  like  children.  Lamb  lays  a  spell  upon 
us  such  as  no  other  writer  can  work;  he 
plays  upon  the  strings  of  our  hearts,  now 
surprising  us  into  wholesome  laughter, 
now  melting  us  to  tears.  You  may  know 
his  essays  by  heart,  but  you  can't  define 
their  elusive  charm. 

Lamb  had  one  of  the  saddest  of  lives,  yet 
he  remained  sweet  and  wholesome  through 
trials  that  would  have  embittered  a  nature 
less  fine  and  noble.  He  came  of  poor  people 
and  he  and  his  sister  Mary  inherited  from 
their  mother  a  strain  of  mental  unsound- 
ness.  Lamb  spent  seven  years  in  Christ's 
Hospital  as  a  "Blue  Coat"  boy,  and  the 
chief  result,  aside  from  the  foundations  of 
a  good  classical  scholarship,  was  a  friend- 

[41] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

ship  for  Coleridge  which  endured  through 
life.  From  this  school  he  was  forced  to  go 
into  a  clerkship  in  the  South  Sea  house, 
but  after  three  years  he  secured  a  desk  in 
the  East  India  house,  where  he  remained 
for  thirty  years. 

Four  years  later  his  first  great  sorrow 
fell  upon  Lamb.  His  sister  Mary  sud- 
denly developed  insanity,  attacked  a  maid 
servant,  and  when  the  mother  interfered 
the  insane  girl  fatally  wounded  her  with  a 
knife.  In  this  crisis  Lamb  showed  the 
fineness  of  his  nature.  Instead  of  permit- 
ting poor  Mary  to  be  consigned  to  a  pub- 
lic insane  asylum,  he  gave  bonds  that  he 
would  care  for  her,  and  he  did  care  for  her 
during  the  remainder  of  her  life.  Although 
in  love  with  a  girl,  he  resolutely  put  aside 
all  thoughts  of  marriage  and  domestic  hap- 
piness and  devoted  himself  to  his  unfor- 
tunate sister,  who  in  her  lucid  periods 
repaid  his  devotion  with  the  tenderest 
affection. 

Lamb's  letters  to  Coleridge  in  those  try- 
ing days  are  among  the  most  pathetic  in 
the  language.  To  Coleridge  he  turned  for 
stimulus  in  his  reading  and  study,  and  he 
never  failed  to  get  help  and  comfort  from 
this  great,  ill-balanced  man  of  genius.  Later 

[42] 


CHARLES  LAMB  AND  ESSAYS  OF  ELIA 

he  began  a  correspondence  with  Southey, 
in  which  he  betrayed  much  humor  and 
great  fancy.  In  his  leisure  he  saturated  his 
mind  with  the  Elizabethan  poets  and  dram- 
atists; practically  he  lived  in  the  sixteenth 
century,  for  his  only  real  life  was  a  stu- 
dent's dream  life.  He  contributed  to  the 
London  newspapers,  but  his  first  published 
work  to  score  any  success  was  his  T'a/es 
From  Shakespeare,  in  which  his  sister  aided 
him.  Then  followed  Poets  Contemporary 
With  Shakespeare,  selections  with  critical 
comment,  which  at  once  gave  Lamb  rank 
among  the  best  critics  of  his  time.  He 
wrote,when  the  mood  seized  him, recollec- 
tions of  his  youth,  essays  and  criticisms 
which  he  afterward  issued  in  two  volumes. 
Twenty-five  essays  that  he  contributed 
to  the  LONDON  MAGAZINE  over  the  signa- 

O 

ture  of  Elia  were  reprinted  in  a  book,  the 
Essays  of  Elia,  and  established  Lamb's  rep- 
utation as  one  of  the  great  masters  of 
English.  Another  volume  of  Essays  of  Elia 
was  published  in  1833.  In  1834  Lamb 
sorrowed  over  the  death  of  Coleridge,  and 
in  November  of  the  same  year  death  came 
to  him.  Of  all  English  critics  Carlyle  is 
the  only  one  who  had  hard  words  for 
Lamb,  and  the  Sage  of  Chelsea  probably 

[43] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

wrote   his   scornful   comment  because   of 
some  playful  jest  of  Elia. 

Charles  Lamb's  taste  was  for  the  wri- 
ters of  the  Elizabethan  age,  and  even  in 
his  time  he  found  that  this  taste  had  become 
old-fashioned.  He  complained,  when  only 
twenty-one  years  old,  in  a  letter  to  Col- 
eridge, that  all  his  friends  "read  nothing  but 
reviews  and  new  books."  His  letters,  like 
his  essays,  refled:  the  reading  of  little-known 
books;  they  show  abundant  traces  of  his 
loiterings  in  the  byways  of  literature. 

Here  there  is  space  only  to  dwell  on 
some  of  the  best  of  the  Essays  of  Elia.  In 
these  we  find  the  most  pathetic  deal  with  the 
sufferings  of  children.  Lamb  himself  had 
known  loneliness  and  suffering  and  lack 
of  appreciation  when  a  boy  in  the  great 
Blue  Coat  School.  Far  more  vividly  than 
Dickens  he  brings  before  us  his  neglected 
childhood  and  all  that  it  represented  in 
lonely  helplessness.  Then  he  deals  with 
later  things,  with  his  love  of  old  books, 
his  passion  for  the  play,  his  delight  in  Lon- 
don and  its  various  aspects,  his  joy  in  all 
strange  characters  like  the  old  benchers  of 
the  Inner  Temple. 

The  essay  opens  with  that  alluring  pic" 
ture  of  the  South  Sea  house,  and  is  followed 

[44] 


MARY  AND  CHARLES  LAMB 

FROM  THE  PAINTING  BY  F.  S.  GARY 

MADE  IN  1834. 


CHARLES  LAMB  AND  ESSAYS  OF  ELIA 

by  the  reminiscences  of  Christ's  Hospital, 
where  Lamb  was  a  schoolboy  for  seven 
years.  These  show  one  side  of  Lamb's 
nature— the  quaintly  reminiscent.  Another 
side  is  revealed  in  "Mrs.  Battle's  Opinions 
on  Whist,"  with  its  delicate  irony  and  its 
playful  humor,  while  still  another  phase  is 
seen  in  the  exquisite  phantasy  of  "Dream 
Children,"  with  its  tender  pathos  and  its 
revelation  of  a  heart  that  never  knew  the 
joys  of  domestic  Jove  and  care.  Yet  close 
after  this  beautiful  reverie  comes  "A  Dis- 
sertation On  Roast  Pig,"  in  which  Lamb 
develops  the  theory  that  the  Chinese  first 
discovered  the  virtues  of  roast  suckling  pig 
after  a  fire  which  destroyed  the  house  of 
Ho-ti,  and  that  with  the  fatuousness  of 
the  race  they  regularly  burned  down  their 
houses  to  enjoy  this  succulent  delicacy. 

The  Last  Essays  of  Ella  ^  a  second  series 
which  Lamb  brought  out  with  a  curious 
preface  "by  a  friend  of  the  late  Elia,"  do 
not  differ  from  the  earlier  series,  save  that 
they  are  shorter  and  are  more  devoted  to 
literary  themes.  Perfecl  in  its  pathos  is 
"The  Superannuated  Man,"  while  "The 
Child  Angel"  is  a  dream  which  appeals  to 
the  reader  more  than  any  of  the  splendid 
dreams  that  De  Quincey  immortalized  in 

[45] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

his  florid  prose.  Lamb  in  these  essays  gives 
some  wise  counsel  on  books  and  reading, 
urging  with  a  whimsical  earnestness  the 
claims  of  the  good  old  books  which  had 
been  his  comfort  in  many  dark  hours.  It 
is  in  such  confidences  that  we  come  very 
close  to  this  man,  so  richly  endowed  with 
all  endearing  qualities  that  the  world  will 
never  forget  Elia  and  his  exquisite  essays. 


DICKENS 

THE  FOREMOST  OF 
NOVELISTS 

MORE  WIDELY  READ  THAN  ANY  OTHER 
STORY  TELLER— THE  GREATEST  OF  THE 
MODERN  HUMORISTS  APPEALS  TO  THE 
READERS  OF  ALL  AGES  AND  CLASSES. 

CHARLES  DICKENS  is  the  greatest  English 
novelist  since  Scott,  and  he  and  Scott, 
to  my  mind,  are  the  greatest  English  wri- 
ters after  Shakespeare.  Many  will  dissent 
from  this,  but  my  reason  for  giving  him 
this  foremost  place  among  the  modern 
writers  is  the  range,  the  variety,  the  dra- 
matic power,  the  humor  and  the  pathos  of 
his  work.  He  was  a  great  caricaturist  rather 
than  a  great  artist,  but  he  was  supreme  in 
his  class,  and  his  grotesque  characters  have 
enough  in  them  of  human  nature  to  make 
them  accepted  as  real  people. 

To  him  belongs  the  first  place  among 
novelists,  after  Scott,  because  of  his  splen- 
did creative  imagination,  which  has  peopled 

[47] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

the  world  of  fiction  with  scores  of  fine  char- 
alters.  His  genial  humor  which  has  bright- 
ened life  for  so  many  thousands  of  readers; 
his  tender  pathos  which  brings  tears  to  the 
eyes  of  those  who  seldom  weep  over  imagi- 
nary or  even  real  grief  or  pain;  his  rollick- 
ing gayety  which  makes  one  enjoy  good 
food  and  good  drink  in  his  tales  almost  as 
much  as  if  one  really  shared  in  those  feasts 
he  was  so  fond  of  describing;  his  keen 
sympathy  with  the  poor  and  the  suffering; 
his  flaming  anger  against  injustice  and  cru- 
elty that  resulted  in  so  many  great  public 
reforms;  his  descriptive  power  that  makes 
the  reader  actually  see  everything  that  he 
depicts— all  these  traits  of  Dickens'  genius 
go  to  make  him  the  unquestioned  leader 
of  our  modern  storytellers.  Without  his 
humor  and  his  pathos  he  would  still  stand 
far  above  all  others  of  his  day;  with  these 
qualities,  which  make  every  story  he  ever 
wrote  throb  with  genuine  human  feeling, 
he  stands  in  a  class  by  himself. 

Many  literary  critics  have  spent  much 
labor  in  comparing  Dickens  with  Thack- 
eray, but  there  seems  to  me  no  basis  for 
such  comparison.  One  was  a  great  carica- 
turist who  wrote  for  the  common  people 
and  brought  tears  or  laughter  at  will  from 

[48] 


CHARLES  DICKENS 

AT  THE  AGE  OF  TWENTY-SEVEN— FROM  THE 
PORTRAIT  BY  DANIEL  MACLISE,  R.  A. 


DICKENS  FOREMOST  OF  NOVELISTS 

the  kitchen  maid  as  freely  as  from  the 
great  lady;  from  the  little  child  with  no 
knowledge  of  the  world  as  readily  as  from 
the  mature  reader  who  has  known  wrong, 
sorrow  and  suffering.  The  other  was  the 
supreme  literary  artist  of  modern  times,  a 
gentleman  by  instind:  and  training,  who 
wrote  for  a  limited  class  of  readers,  and 
who  could  not,  because  of  nature  and  tem- 
perament, touch  at  will  the  springs  of 
laughter  and  tears  as  Dickens  did.  Dickens 
has  created  a  score  of  characters  that  are 
household  words  to  one  that  Thackeray 
has  given  us. 

Both  were  men  of  the  rarest  genius, 
English  to  the  core,  but  each  expressed  his 
genius  in  his  own  way,  and  the  way  of 
Dickens  touched  a  thousand  hearts  where 
Thackeray  touched  but  one.  Personally, 
Thackeray  appeals  to  me  far  more  than 
Dickens  does,  but  it  is  foolish  to  permit 
one's  own  fancies  to  blind  or  warp  his 
critical  judgments.  Hence  I  set  Dickens 
at  the  head  of  modern  novelists  and  give 
him  an  equal  place  with  Scott  as  the  great- 
est English  writer  since  Shakespeare. 

Take  it  all  in  all,  Dickens  had  a  success- 
ful and  a  happy  life.  He  was  born  in  1812 
and  died  in  1870.  His  boyhood  was  hard 

[49l 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

because  of  his  father's  thriftlessness,  and  it 
always  rankled  in  his  memory  that  at  nine 
years  of  age  he  was  placed  at  work  pasting 
labels  on  boxes  of  shoe  blacking.  But  he 
had  many  chances  in  childhood  and  youth 
for  reading  and  study,  and  his  keen  mind 
took  advantage  of  all  these.  He  was  a 
natural  mimic,  and  it  was  mere  blind  chance 
that  kept  him  from  the  stage  and  made 
him  a  great  novelist.  He  drifted  into  news- 
paper work  as  a  shorthand  reporter,  wrote 
the  stories  that  are  known  as  Sketches  by 
Boz,  and  in  this  way  came  to  be  engaged 
to  write  the  Pickwick  Papers,  to  serve  as  a 
story  to  accompany  drawings  by  Seymour, 
a  popular  artist.  But  Dickens  from  the 
outset  planned  the  story  and  Seymour 
lived  only  to  illustrate  the  first  number. 

The  tale  caught  the  fancy  of  the  public, 
and  Dickens  developed  Pickwick,  the  Wel- 
lers  and  other  characters  in  a  most  amusing 
fashion.  Great  success  marked  the  appear- 
ance of  the  Pickwick  Papers  in  book  form, 
and  the  public  appreciation  gave  Dickens 
confidence  and  stimulus.  Soon  appeared 
Oliver  'Twist,  Nicholas  Nickleby,  OldCurosity 
Shop  and  the  long  line  of  familiar  stories 
that  ended  with  The  Mystery  of  Edtvin 
Drood,  left  unfinished  by  the  master's  hand. 

[50] 


DICKENS  FOREMOST  OF  NOVELISTS 

All  these  novels  were  originally  pub- 
lished in  monthly  numbers.  In  these  days, 
when  so  many  new  novels  come  from  the 
press  every  month,  it  is  difficult  to  appre- 
ciate the  eagerness  with  which  one  of  these 
monthly  parts  of  Dickens'  stories  was 
awaited  in  England  as  well  as  in  this  coun- 
try. My  father  used  to  tell  of  the  way 
these  numbers  of  Dickens'  novels  were 
seized  upon  in  New  England  when  he  was 
a  young  man  and  were  worn  out  in  passing 
from  hand  to  hand.  Dickens  first  devel- 
oped the  Christmas  story  and  made  it  a 
real  addition  to  the  joy  of  the  holiday 
season.  His  Christmas  Caro/and  'The  Cricket 
on  the  Hearth  still  stand  as  the  best  of  these 
tales  that  paint  the  simple  joys  of  the  great- 
est of  English  Holidays.  Dickens  was 
also  a  great  editor,  and  in  HOUSEHOLD 
WORDS  and  ALL  THE  YEAR  ROUND  he 
found  a  means  of  giving  pleasure  to  hosts  of 
readers  as  well  as  a  vehicle  for  the  monthly 
publication  of  his  novels. 

Dickens  was  the  first  to  make  a  great 
fortune  by  giving  public  readings  from  his 
own  works.  His  rare  dramatic  ability  made 
him  an  ideal  interpreter  of  his  own  work, 
and  those  who  were  fortunate  enough  to 

o 

hear  him  on  his  two  trips  to  this  country 

[5-] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

speak  always  of  the  light  which  these  read- 
ings cast  on  his  principal  characters  and  of 
the  pleasure  that  the  audience  showed  in 
the  novelist's  remarkable  powers  as  a  mimic 
and  an  elocutionist. 

Most  of  the  great  English  writers  have 
labored  until  forty  or  over  before  fame  came 
to  them.  Of  such  were  Scott,  Thackeray, 
Carlyle  and  George  Eliot.  But  Dickens 
had  an  international  fame  at  twenty-four, 
and  he  was  a  household  word  wherever 
English  was  spoken  by  the  time  he  was 
thirty.  From  that  day  to  the  day  of  his 
death,  fame,  popularity,  wealth,  troops  of 
friends,  were  his  portion,  and  with  these 
were  joined  unusual  capacity  for  work  and 
unusual  delight  in  the  exercise  of  his  great 
creative  powers. 

In  taking  up  Dickens'  novels  it  must 
always  be  borne  in  mind  that  you  will  find 
many  digressions,  many  bits  of  affectation, 
some  mawkish  pathos.  But  these  defects  do 
not  seriously  injure  the  stories.  You  cannot 
afford  to  leave  Pickwick  Papers  unread, 
because  this  novel  contains  more  sponta- 
neous humor  than  any  other  of  Dickens' 
work,  and  it  is  also  quoted  most  frequently. 
The  boy  or  girl  who  cannot  follow  with 
relish  the  amusing  incidents  in  this  book 

[52] 


POSTHUMOUS  PAPERS 


LONDON:  CHAPMAN*  HALU-ldC,  STRANC. 


ORIGINAL  PICKWICK  COVER  ISSUED  IN  1837 

WITH  DICKENS' AUTOGRAPH— MOST  OF  DICKENS' NOVELS 

WERE  ISSUED  IN  SHILLING  INSTALLMENTS  BEFORE 

BEING  PUBLISHED  IN  THE  COMPLETE  VOLUME 


DICKENS  FOREMOST  OF  NOVELISTS 

is  not  normal.  Older  readers  will  get 
more  from  the  book,  but  it  is  doubtful 
whether  they  will  enjoy  its  rollicking  fun 
with  so  keen  a  zest.  Mr.  Pickwick,  Sam 
Weller  and  his  father,  Bob  Sawyer  and  the 
others,  how  firmly  they  are  fixed  in  the 
mind!  What  real  flesh  and  blood  creatures 
they  are,  despite  their  creator's  exaggera- 
tion of  special  traits  and  peculiarities! 

After  the  Pickwick  Papers  the  choice  of 
the  most  characteristic  of  Dickens'  novels 
is  difficult,  but  my  favorites  have  always 
been  David  Copperfield  and  A  'Tale  of  'Two 
Cities,  the  one  the  most  spontaneous,  the 
freshest  in  fancy,  the  most  deeply  pathetic 
of  all  Dickens' work;  the  other  absolutely 
unlike  anything  he  ever  wrote,  but  great 
in  its  intense  descriptive  passages,  which 
make  the  horrors  of  the  French  Revolution 
more  real  than  Carlyle's  famous  history, 
and  in  the  sublime  self-sacrifice  of  Sidney 
Carton,  which  Henry  Miller,  in  "The  Only 
Way,"  has  impressed  on  thousands  of  tear- 
ful playgoers.  That  David  Copperfield  is 
not  autobiographical  we  have  the  positive 
assertion  of  Charles  Dickens  the  younger, 
yet  at  the  same  time  every  lover  of  this 
book  feels  that  the  boyhood  of  David  repro- 
duces memories  of  the  novelist's  childhood 

[53] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

and  youth,  and  that  from  real  people  and 
real  scenes  are  drawn  the  humble  home  and 
the  loyal  hearts  of  the  Peggottys,  the  great 
self-sacrifice  of  Ham,  the  woes  of  Little 
Emily  and  the  tragedy  of  Steerforth's  fate. 
One  misses  much  who  does  not  follow  the 
chief  actors  in  this  great  story,  the  master- 
piece of  Dickens. 

Other  fine  novels,  if  you  have  time  for 
them,  are  Nicholas  Nickleby,  which  broke 
up  the  unspeakably  cruel  boarding  schools 
for  boys  in  Yorkshire,  in  one  of  which  poor 
Smike  was  done  to  death;  or  Our  Mutual 
Friend  An  which  Dickens  attacked  the  Ene- 

O 

lish  poor  laws;  or  Dombey  and  Son,  that 
paints  the  pathos  of  the  child  of  a  rich  man 
dying  for  the  love  which  his  father  was  too 
selfish  to  give  him;  or  Bleak  House,  in 
which  the  terrible  sufferings  wrought  by 
the  law's  delay  in  the  Court  of  Chancery 
are  drawn  with  so  much  pathos  that  the 
book  served  as  a  valuable  aid  in  removing 
a  great  public  wrong,  while  the  satire  on 
foreign  missions  served  to  draw  the  Eng- 
lish nation's  attention  to  the  wretched 
heathen  at  home  in  the  East  Side  of  Lon- 
don, of  whom  Poor  Jo  was  a  pitiable 
specimen.  In  other  novels  other  good  pur- 
poses were  also  served. 

[54] 


DICKENS  FOREMOST  OF  NOVELISTS 

But  several  pages  could  be  filled  with  a 
mere  enumeration  of  Dickens'  stories  and 
their  salient  features.  You  cannot  go  wrong 
in  taking  up  any  of  his  novels  or  his  short 
stories,  and  when  you  have  finished  with 
them  you  will  have  the  satisfaction  of  hav- 
ing added  to  your  possessions  a  number  of 
the  real  people  of  fiction,  whom  it  is  far 
better  to  know  than  the  best  characters  of 
contemporary  ficlion,  because  these  will  be 
forgotten  in  a  twelvemonth,  if  not  before. 
The  hours  that  you  spend  with  Dickens 
will  be  profitable  as  well  as  pleasant,  for 
they  will  leave  the  memory  of  a  great- 
hearted man  who  labored  through  his  books 
to  make  the  world  better  and  happier. 


[55] 


THACKERAY 

GREATEST  MASTER  OF 

FICTION 

THE  MOST  ACCOMPLISHED  WRITER  OF 
His  CENTURY— TENDER  PATHOS  UNDER 
AN  AFFECTATION  OF  CYNICISM  AND 
GREAT  ART  IN  STYLE  AND  CHARACTERS. 

OF  all  modern  English  authors,  Thack- 
eray is  my  favorite.  Humor,  pathos, 
satire,  ripe  culture,  knowledge  of  the  world 
and  of  the  human  heart,  instinctive  good 
taste  and  a  style  equaled  by  none  of  his 
fellows  in  its  clearness,  ease,  flexibility  and 
winning  charm— these  are  some  of  the  traits 
that  make  the  author  of  Vanity  Fair  and 
Esmond  incomparably  the  first  literary  artist 
as  well  as  the  greatest  writer  of  his  age. 
Whether  he  would  have  been  as  fine  a 
writer  had  he  been  given  a  happy  life  is  a 
question  that  no  one  can  answer.  But  to 
my  mind  it  has  always  seemed  as  though 
the  dark  shadow  that  rested  on  his  domes- 
tic life  for  thirty  years  made  him  infinitely 

[56] 


WILLIAM  MAKEPEACE  THACKERAY 

FROM  A  DRAWING  BY  SAMUEL  LAURENCE, 

ENGRAVED  BY  J.  C.  ARMYTAGE 


THACKERAY  THE  MASTER  OF  FICTION 

tender  to  the  grief  and  pain  of  others. 
Probably  it  came  as  a  shock  to  most  lovers 
of  Thackeray  to  read  in  a  news  item  from 
London  only  three  or  four  years  ago  that 
the  widow  of  Thackeray  was  dead,  at  the 
great  age  of  ninety  years.  She  had  outlived 
her  famous  husband  nearly  a  full  half  cen- 
tury, but  of  her  we  had  heard  nothing  in 
all  this  time.  When  a  beautiful  young  Irish 
girl  she  was  married  to  the  novelist,  and 
she  made  him  an  ideal  wife  for  a  few  years. 
Then  her  mind  give  way, and  the  remainder 
of  her  long  career  was  spent  within  the 
walls  of  a  sanatorium— more  lost  to  her 
loved  ones  than  if  she  had  been  buried  in 
her  grave.  The  knowledge  of  her  existence, 
which  was  a  ghastly  death  in  life,  the  fad: 
that  it  prevented  him  from  giving  his  three 
young  girls  a  real  home,  as  well  as  barred 
him  under  the  English  law  from  marrying 
again— all  these  things  to  Thackeray  were 
an  ever-present  pain,  like  acid  on  an  open 
wound.  It  was  this  sorrow,  from  which  he 
could  never  escape  that  gave  such  exquisite 
tenderness  to  his  pathos;  and  it  was  this  sor- 
row, ading  on  one  of  the  most  sensitive 
natures,  that  often  sharpened  his  satire  and 
made  it  merciless  when  directed  against 

O 

the  shams  and  hypocrisies  of  life. 

[57] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

Thackeray's  fame  rests  mainly  on  two 
great  books—vanity  Fair  and  Henry  Esmond. 
The  first  has  been  made  very  real  to  thou- 
sands of  readers  by  the  brilliant  acting  of 
Mrs.  Fiske  in  Becky  Sharp.  The  other  is 
one  of  the  finest  historical  novels  in  the 
language  and  the  greatest  exploit  in  bring- 
ing over  into  our  century  the  style,  the 
mode  of  thought,  the  very  essence  of  a  pre- 
vious age.  Thackeray  was  saturated  with 
the  literature  of  the  eighteenth  century, 
and  in  Esmond  he  reproduced  the  time  of 
Addison  and  Steele  as  perfectly  as  he  made 
an  imitation  of  a  number  of  the  SPECTATOR. 
This  literary  tour  de  force  was  made  the 
more  noteworthy  by  the  absolute  lack  of 
all  effort  on  the  novelist's  part.  The  style 
of  Queen  Anne's  age  seemed  a  part  of  the 
man,  not  an  assumed  garment.  While  in 
the  heroine  of  Vanity  Fair  Thackeray  gave 
the  world  one  of  the  coldest  and  most 
selfish  of  women,  he  atoned  for  this  by 
creating  in  Esmond  the  finest  gentleman 

O  O 

in  all  English  literature,  with  the  single 
exception  of  his  own  Colonel  Newcome. 

Strict  injunctions  Thackeray  left  against 
any  regulation  biography,  and  the  result 
is  that  the  world  knows  less  of  his  life 
before  fame  came  to  him  than  it  does  of 

[58] 


Z.  Off  DO  ts 
SMITH    ELDER  iC°   15  WATERLOO  PLACE 

TITLE-PAGE  TO  "VANITY  FAIR"  DRAWN  BY 

THACKERAY,  WHO  FURNISHED  THE  ILLUSTRATIONS 

FOR  MANY  OF  HIS  F.ARLIER  EDITIONS 


THACKERAY  THE  MASTER  OF  FICTION 

any  other  celebrated  author  of  his  age. 
The  scanty  facls  show  that  he  was  born  in 
Calcutta  in  1 8 1 1 ;  that  he  was  left  a  fortune 
of  $100,000  by  his  father,  who  died  when 
he  was  five  years  old;  that,  like  most  chil- 
dren of  Anglo-Indians,  he  was  sent  to 
school  in  England;  that  he  was  prepared  for 
college  at  the  old  Charter  House  School; 
that  he  was  graduated  from  Trinity  Col- 
lege, Cambridge,  and  that  while  in  college 
he  showed  much  ability  as  a  writer  of 
verse  and  prose,  although  he  took  no 
honors  and  gained  no  prizes.  After  reading 
law  he  was  moved  to  become  an  artist  and 
spent  some  time  in  travel  on  the  Continent. 

But  this  delightful  life  was  rudely  cut 
short  by  the  loss  of  his  fortune  and  he  was 
forced  to  earn  his  living  by  literature  and 
journalism.  Under  various  pseudonyms  he 
soon  gained  a  reputation  as  a  satirist  and 
humorist,  his  first  success  being  'The  Great 
Hoggarty  Diamond.  Then  years  of  work  for 
PUNCH  and  other  papers  followed  before 
he  won  enduring  fame  by  Vanity  Fair, 
which  he  styled  "a  novel  without  a  hero." 

Charlotte  Bronte,  who  gained  a  great 
reputation  by  Jane  Eyrey  added  to  Thack- 
eray's vogue  by  dedicating  to  him  in  rarely 
eloquent  words  the  second  edition  of  her 

[59] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

novel,  against  which  preachers  fulminated 
because  of  what  they  called  its  immoral  ten- 
dencies. Then  in  rapid  succession  Thack- 
eray wrote  PendenniS)  Henry  Esmond,  'The 
Newcomes,  The  Virginians,  Love/  the  Wid- 
ower and  The  Adventures  of  Philip.  All 
these  are  masterpieces  of  wit,  satire  and 
humor,  cast  in  a  perfect  style  that  never 
offends  the  most  fastidious  taste,  yet  they 
are  neglected  to-day  mainly  because  they 
do  not  furnish  exciting  incidents. 

Thackeray,  like  Dickens  in  his  readings, 

«•    •*  O     •* 

made  a  fortune  by  his  lectures,  first  on 
"The  English  Humorists,"  and  later  on 
"The  Four  Georges,"  and,  like  Dickens, 
he  received  the  heartiest  welcome  and  the 
largest  money  returns  from  this  country. 

He  died  alone  in  his  room  on  Christmas 
eve  in  the  fine  new  home  in  London  which 
he  had  recently  made  for  himself  and  his 
three  daughters. 

Thackeray  was  a  giant  physically,  with 
a  mind  that  worked  easily,  but  he  was  indo- 
lent and  always  wrote  under  pressure,  with 
the  printer's  devil  waiting  for  his  "copy." 
He  was  a  thorough  man  of  the  world,  yet 
full  of  the  freshness  of  fancy  and  the  tender- 
ness of  heart  of  a  little  child.  All  children 
were  a  delight  to  him,  and  he  never  could 

[60] 


THACKERAY  THE  MASTER  OF  FICTION 

refrain  from  giving  them  extravagant  tips. 
The  ever-present  grief  that  could  not  be 
forgotten  by  fame  or  success  made  him 
very  tender  to  all  suffering,  especially  the 
suffering  of  the  weak  and  the  helpless. 
Yet,  like  many  a  sensitive  man,  he  con- 
cealed this  kindness  of  heart  under  an 
affectation  of  cynicism,  which  led  many 
unsympathetic  critics  to  style  him  hard  and 
ferocious  in  his  satire. 

Like  Dickens,  Thackeray  was  one  of  the 
great  reporters  of  his  day,  with  an  eye  that 
took  in  unconsciously  every  detail  of  face, 
costume  or  scene  and  reproduced  it  with 
perfect  accuracy.  The  reader  of  his  novels  is 
entertained  by  a  series  of  pen  pictures  of 
men  and  women  and  scenes  in  high  life 
and  life  below  stairs  that  are  photographic 
in  their  clearness  and  fidelity.  Dickens 
always  failed  when  he  came  to  depict  Brit- 
ish aristocratic  life;  but  Thackeray  moved 
in  drawing-rooms  and  brilliant  assemblages 
with  the  ease  of  a  man  familiar  from  youth 
with  good  society,  and  hence  free  from  all 
embarrassment,  even  in  the  presence  of 
royalty. 

Thackeray's  early  works  are  written  in 
the  same  perfect,  easy,  colloquial  style,  rich 
in  natural  literary  allusions  and  frequently 

[61] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

rhythmic  with  poetic  feeling,  which  marked 
his  latest  novel.  He  also  had  perfect  com- 
mand of  slang  and  the  cockney  dialed:  of 
the  Londoner.  No  greater  master  of  dia- 
logue or  narrative  ever  wrote  than  he  who 

fO 

pictured  the  gradual  degradation  of  Becky 
Sharp  or  the  many  self-sacrifices  of  Henry 
Esmond  for  the  woman  that  he  loved. 

Howells  and  other  critics  have  censured 
Thackeray  severely  because  of  his  tendency 
to  preach,  and  also  because  he  regarded  his 
characters  as  puppets  and  himself  as  the 
showman  who  brought  out  their  peculiari- 
ties. There  is  some  ground  for  this  criticism, 
if  one  regards  the  art  of  the  novelist  as 
centered  wholly  in  realism;  but  such  a  hard 
and  fast  rule  would  condemn  all  old  English 
novelists  from  Richardson  to  Thackeray. 

It  ought  not  to  disturb  any  reader  that 
Defoe  turns  aside  and  gives  reflections  on 
the  acts  of  his  characters,  for  these  remarks 
are  the  fruit  of  his  own  knowledge  of  the 
world.  In  the  same  way  Thackeray  keeps 
up  a  running  comment  on  his  men  and 
women,  and  these  bits  of  philosophy  make 
his  novels  a  storehouse  of  apothegms, which 
may  be  read  again  and  again  with  great 
profit  and  pleasure.  The  modern  novel, 
with  its  comparative  lack  of  thought  and 

[62] 


WILLIAM  MAKEPEACE  THACKERAY 

A  CARICATURE  DRAWN 

BY  HIMSELF 


THACKERAY  THE  MASTER  OF  FICTION 

feeling,  its  insistence  upon  the  absolute 
effacement  of  the  author,  is  seldom  worth 
reading  a  second  time.  Not  so  with  Thack- 
eray. Every  reading  reveals  new  beauties 
of  thought  or  style.  An  entire  book  has 
been  made  up  of  brief  extracts  from  Thack- 
eray's novels,  and  it  is  an  ideal  little  volume 
for  a  pocket  companion  on  walks,as  Thack- 
eray fits  into  any  mood  and  always  gives  one 
material  for  thought. 

Of  all  Thackeray's  novels  Vanity  Fair 
is  the  best  known  and  most  popular.  It  is 
a  remarkable  picture  of  a  thoroughly  hard, 
selfish  woman  whom  even  motherhood  did 
not  soften;  but  it  is  something  more  than 
the  chronicle  of  Becky  Sharp's  fortunes. 
It  is  a  panoramic  sketch  of  many  phases 
of  London  life;  it  is  the  free  giving  out  by 
a  great  master  of  fiction  of  his  impressions 
of  life.  Hence  Vanity  Fair  alone  is  worth 
a  hundred  books  filled  merely  with  exciting 
adventures,  which  do  not  make  the  reader 
think.  The  problems  that  Thackeray  pre- 
sents in  his  masterpiece  are  those  of  love, 
duty,  self-sacrifice;  of  high  aims  and  many 
temptations  to  fall  below  those  aspirations; 
of  sordid,  selfish  life,  and  of  fine,  noble, 
generous  souls  who  light  up  the  world  and 
make  it  richer  by  their  presence. 

[63] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

Thackeray,  in  Vanity  Fair,  has  sixty 
characters,  yet  each  is  drawn  sharply  and 
clearly,  and  the  whole  story  moves  on  with 
the  ease  of  real  life.  Consummate  art  is 
shown  in  the  painting  of  Becky's  gradual 
rise  to  power  and  the  great  scene  at  the 
climax  of  her  success,  when  Rawdon  Craw- 
ley  strikes  down  the  Marquis  of  Steyne, 
is  one  of  the  finest  in  all  fiction.  Though 
Becky  knows  that  this  blow  shatters  her 
social  edifice,  she  is  still  woman  enough 
to  admire  her  husband  in  the  very  act  that 
marks  the  beginning  of  the  decadence  of 
her  fortunes.  Vanity  Fair,  read  carefully  a 
half-dozen  times,  is  a  liberal  education  in 
life  and  in  the  art  of  the  novelist. 

Personally,!  rankPendennis  next  to  Van- 
ity Fair  for  the  pleasure  to  be  derived  from 
it.  From  the  time  when  the  old  Major 
receives  the  letter  from  his  sister  telling 
of  young  Arthur's  infatuation  for  the  cheap 
actress,  Miss  Fotheringay,  the  story  car- 
ries one  along  in  the  leisurely  way  of  the 
last  century.  All  the  people  are  a  delight, 
from  Captain  Costigan  to  Fowker,  and 
from  the  French  chef,  who  went  to  the 
piano  for  stimulus  in  his  culinary  work,  to 
Blanche  Amory  and  her  amazing  French 
affectations.  But  Pendennis  is  not  popular. 

[64] 


THACKERAY  THE  MASTER  OF  FICTION 

Nor  is  Henry  Esmond  popular,  although 
it  is  worthy  to  rank  with  'The  Cloister  and 
the  Hearth,  Adam  Eede  and  Tess  of  the 
D'  Urbervilles.  There  is  little  relief  of  hu- 
mor in  Esmond,  but  the  story  has  a  strong 
appeal  to  any  sympathetic  reader,  and  it  is 
the  one  supreme  achievement  in  all  fiction 
in  which  the  hero  tells  his  own  story. 
Thackeray's  art  is  flawless  in  this  tale,  and 
it  sometimes  rises  to  great  heights,  as  in 
the  scenes  following  the  death  of  Lord 
Castlewood,  the  exposure  of  the  Prince's 
perfidy,  the  selfishness  of  Beatrice  and  the 
great  sacrifice  of  Esmond. 

Space  is  lacking  to  take  up  Thackeray's 
other  works,  but  it  is  safe  to  say  if  you 
read  the  three  novels  here  hastily  sketched 
you  cannot  go  amiss  among  his  minor 
works.  Even  his  lighter  sketches  and  his 
essays  will  be  found  full  of  material  that 
is  so  far  above  the  ordinary  level  that  the 
similar  work  of  to-day  seems  cheap  and 
common.  Happy  is  the  boy  or  girl  who 
has  made  Thackeray  a  chosen  companion 
from  childhood.  Such  a  one  has  received 
unconsciously  lessons  in  life  and  in  culture 
that  can  be  gained  from  few  of  the  great 
authors  of  the  world. 

[65] 


CHARLOTTE  BRONTE 

AND  HER  Two  GREAT 

NOVELS 

'JANE  EYRE"AND"VILLETTE"ARETOUCHED 
WITH  GENIUS— TRAGEDY  OF  A  WOMAN'S 
LIFE  THAT  RESULTED  IN  Two  STORIES 
OF  PASSIONATE  REVOLT  AGAINST  FATE. 

CHARLOTTE  BRONTE  is  always  linked  in 
my  memory  with  Thackeray  because 
of  her  visit  to  the  author  of  Vanity  Fair 
and  its  humorous  and  pathetic  features. 
She  went  to  London  from  her  lonely  York- 
shire home,  and  the  great  world,  with  its 
many  selfish  and  unlovely  features,  made 
a  painful  impression  on  her.  Even  Thack- 
eray, her  idol,  was  found  to  have  feet  of 
clay.  But  this  "little  Puritan,"as  the  great 
man  called  her,  was  endowed  with  the 
divine  genius  which  was  forced  to  seek 
expression  in  fiction,  and  nowhere  in  all 
literature  will  one  find  an  author  who  shows 
more  completely  the  compelling  force  of 
a  powerful  creative  imagination  than  this 

[66] 


CHARLOTTE  BRONTE 

FROM  THE  EXQUISITELY  SYMPATHETIC  CRAYON 

PORTRAIT  BY  GEORGE   RICHMOND,  R.  A. 

NOW  IN  THE  NATIONAL  PORTRAIT 

GALLERY  OF  LONDON 


CHARLOTTE  BRONTE'S  GREAT  NOVELS 

little,  frail,  self-educated  woman,  who  had 
none  of  the  advantages  of  her  fellow  wri- 
ters, but  who  surpassed  them  all  in  a 
certain  fierce,  Celtic  spirit  which  forces  the 
reader  to  follow  its  bidding. 

He  who  would  get  a  full  realization  of 
the  importance  of  this  Celtic  element  in 
English  literature  cannot  afford  to  neglect 
Jane  Eyre  and  Villette^  the  best  of  Char- 
lotte Bronte's  works.  Old-fashioned  these 
romances  are  in  many  ways,  oversenti- 
mental,  in  parts  poorly  constructed,  but  in 
all  English  fiction  there  is  nothing  to  sur- 
pass the  opening  chapters  of  Jane  Eyre 
for  vividness  and  pathos,  and  few  things 
to  equal  the  greater  part  of  Villettet  the 
tragedy  of  an  English  woman's  life  in  a 
Brussels  boarding  school. 

Who  can  explain  the  mystery  of  the 
flowering  of  a  great  literary  style  among 
the  bleak  and  desolate  moors  of  York- 
shire? Who  can  tell  why  among  three 
daughters  of  an  Irish  curate  of  mediocre 
ability  but  tremendously  passionate  nature 
one  should  have  developed  an  abnormal 
imagination  that  in  Wuthering  Heights  is 
as  powerful  as  Poe's  at  his  best,  and  another 
should  have  matured  into  the  ablest  woman 
novelist  of  her  day  and  her  generation? 

[67] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

These  are  freaks  of  heredity  which  science 
utterly  fails  to  explain. 

Charlotte  Bronte  was  born  in  1816  and 
died  in  1855.  She  was  one  of  six  children 
who  led  a  curiously  forlorn  life  in  the  old 
Haworth  parsonage  in  the  midst  of  the 
desolate  Yorkshire  moors.  The  outlook  on 
one  side  was  upon  a  gloomy  churchyard; 
on  the  other  three  sides  the  eye  ranged  to 
the  horizon  over  rolling,  dreary  moorland 
that  looked  like  a  heaving  ocean  under  a 
leaden  sky.  One  brother  these  five  sisters 
had,  a  brilliant  but  superficial  boy,  with  no 
stable  character,  who  became  a  drunkard 
and  died  after  lingering  on  for  years,  a 
source  of  intense  shame  to  his  family.  The 
girls  were  left  motherless  at  an  early  age. 
Four  were  sent  to  a  boarding  school  for 

O 

clergymen's  daughters,  but  two  died  from 
exposure  and  lack  of  nutritious  food,  and 
the  others,  starved  mentally  and  physically, 
returned  to  their  home.  This  was  the 
school  that  Charlotte  held  up  to  infamy 
in  'Jane  Eyre. 

The  three  sisters  who  were  left,  in  the 
order  of  their  ages,  were  Emily,  Charlotte 
and  Anne.  They,  with  their  brother,  lived 
in  a  kind  of  dream  world.  Charlotte  was 
the  natural  story-teller,  and  she  wove  end- 

[68] 


CHARLOTTE  BRONTE'S  GREAT  NOVELS 

less  romances  in  which  figured  the  great 
men  of  history  who  were  her  heroes.  She 
also  told  over  and  over  many  weird  York- 
shire leg-ends.  These  children  devoured 

O 

every  bit  of  printed  matter  that  came  to 
the  parsonage,  and  they  were  as  thoroughly 
informed  on  all  political  questions  as  the 
average  member  of  Parliament. 

At  an  age  when  normal  girls  were  play- 
ing with  their  dolls  these  precocious  chil- 
dren were  writing  poems  and  stories.  Their 
father  developed  the  ways  of  a  recluse 
and  never  took  his  meals  with  his  children. 
Living  in  this  dream  world  of  their  own, 
these  children  could  not  understand  nor- 
mal girls.  They  were  terribly  unhappy  at 
school  and  came  near  to  death  of  home- 
sickness. Finally  Emily  and  Charlotte 
found  a  congenial  school  and  in  a  few  years 
they  both  made  great  strides  in  education. 
Charlotte  tried  teaching  and  also  the  work 
of  governess,  but  finally  both  decided  to 
open  a  girls'  school  of  their  own.  To  pre- 
pare themselves  in  French,  Emily  and 
Charlotte  went  to  a  boarding  school  in 
Brussels. 

This  was  the  turning  point  in  Charlotte's 
life.  Intensely  ambitious,  she  worked  like 
a  galley  slave  and  soon  mastered  French 

[69] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

so  that  she  wrote  it  with  ease  and  vigor. 
There  is  no  question  that  she  had  a  girlish 
love  for  her  teacher,  as  passionate  as  it  was 
brief,  and  that  her  whole  outlook  was 
broadened  by  this  experience  of  a  world  so 
unlike  the  only  one  that  she  had  known. 

The  story  of  Charlotte's  life  is  told  beau- 
tifully by  Mrs.  Gaskell,  the  well-known 
author  of  Cranford.  It  is  one  of  the  finest 
biographies  in  the  language,  and  also  one 
of  the  most  stimulating.  The  reader  who 
follows  Charlotte's  stormy  youth  is  made 
ashamed  of  his  own  lack  of  application 
when  he  reads  of  the  girl's  tireless  work  in 
self-culture  in  the  face  of  much  bodily 
weakness  and  great  unhappiness. 

Read  of  her  experiences  in  Brussels  and 
you  will  get  some  idea  of  the  tremendous 
vitality  of  this  frail  girl  with  the  luminous 
eyes  and  the  fiery  spirit  that  no  labor  could 
tire.  Mrs.  Gaskell  has  drawn  largely  upon 
Charlotte's  letters,  which  are  as  vivid  and 
full  of  character  as  any  of  her  fiction.  Gen- 
ius flashes  from  them;  one  feels  drawn  very 
close  to  this  woman  who  raged  against  her 
physical  infirmities,  but  overcame  them 
bravely.  When  the  spirit  moved  her  she 
poured  out  her  soul  to  her  friend  in  words 
that  grip  the  heart  after  all  these  years. 


CHARLOTTE  BRONTE'S  GREAT  NOVELS 

The  boarding-school  project  fell  through^ 
and  for  some  years  the  three  sisters  lived 
at  home  and  devoted  themselves  to  literary 
work.  The  first  fruits  of  their  pen  was  a 
small  volume  of  poems  by  Currer,  Ellis 
and  Acton  Bell,  the  pseudonyms  of  Char- 
lotte, Emily  and  Anne.  This  book  fell 
practically  stillborn  from  the  press,  but  the 
sisters  were  undaunted  and  each  began  a 
novel.  Without  experience  of  life  it  is  not 
strange  that  these  stories  lacked  merit. 

Charlotte  drew  her  novel  from  her  Brus- 
sels experience  and  called  it  T^he  Professor. 
Though  it  was  far  the  best,  it  was  rejected, 
but  Emily's  IVuthering  Heights  and  Anne's 
Agnes  Gray  were  published.  Emily's  novel 
revealed  a  powerful  but  ill-regulated  imagi- 
nation, with  scenes  of  splendid  imaginative 
force,  yet  morbid  and  unreal  as  an  opium 
dream.  It  received  some  good  notices,  but 
Anne's  was  mediocre  and  fell  flat.  Noth- 
ing daunted  by  the  refusal  of  the  publishers 
to  bring  out  her  first  book,  Charlotte  began 
Jane  Eyre,  largely  autobiographical  in  the 
early  chapters,  and  this  book  was  promptly 
accepted  and  published  in  August,  1847. 

Jane  Eyre  was  a  great  success  from  the 
day  it  came  from  the  press.  1 1  was  an  epoch- 
making  novel  because  it  dragged  into  the 

[71] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

fierce  light  of  publicity  many  questions 
which  the  English  public  of  that  day  had 
decided  to  leave  out  of  print.  To  us  of 
today  it  contains  nothing  unusual,  for  mod- 
ern women  writers  have  gone  far  beyond 
Charlotte  Bronte  in  their  demands  for 
freedom  from  many  strict  social  conven- 
tions. What  makes  the  book  valuable  is 
the  glimpse  which  it  gives  of  the  wild 
revolt  of  a  passionate  nature  against  the 
coldness,  the  hypocrisy  and  the  many 
shams  of  the  social  life  of  England  in  the 

O 

middle  of  the  last  century. 

This  novel  is  also  noteworthy  for  its 
intense  picture  of  the  sufferings  of  a  lonely, 
unappreciated  girl,  who  felt  in  herself  the 
stirrings  of  genius  and  who  hungered  and 
thirsted  for  appreciation.  The  terrible  pic- 
tures of  Lowood,  the  fiction  name  of  the 
Cowan's  Bridge  School,  where  her  two  sis- 
ters contracted  their  fatal  illness, are  stamped 
upon  the  brain  of  every  reader,  as  are  those 
of  the  humiliations  of  the  governess.  The 
style  of  this  book  was  a  revelation  in  that 
period  of  formal  writing.  Like  Stevenson, 
Charlotte  Bronte  wrought  with  words  as  a 
great  artist  works  with  his  colors,  and  many 
of  her  descriptions  in  Jane  Eyre  have  never 
been  surpassed.  Hers  was  that  brooding 

[72] 


.. 


MRS.  GASKELL 

FROM  THE  PORTRAIT  BY  GEORGE  RICHMOND,  R.  A. 

MRS.  GASKELL' s"LiFE  OF  BRONTE"  is  ONE  OF  THE 

FINEST  BIOGRAPHIES  IN  THE  LANGUAGE 


CHARLOTTE  BRONTE'S  GREAT  NOVELS 

Celtic  imagination  which,  when  given  full 
play,  takes  the  reader  by  the  hand  and 
shows  him  the  heights  and  depths  of 
human  love  and  suffering. 

The  success  of  Jane  Eyre  opened  wide 
the  doors  of  London  to  the  unknown 
author.  For  a  time  her  identity  was  hid- 
den, but  when  it  was  revealed  she  was 
induced  to  go  up  to  London  and  see  the 
great  world.  Thackeray  was  especially  kind 
to  her,  but  his  efforts  to  entertain  this 
Yorkshire  recluse  were  dismal  failures. 
Nothing  is  more  amusing  than  his  daugh- 
ter's story  of  the  great  novelist,  slipping 
out  of  the  house  one  night,  when  he  had 
asked  several  celebrities  to  meet  Charlotte 
Bronte.  The  party  was  a  terrible  fiasco, 
and  so  he  escaped,  putting  his  finger  to  his 
lips  as  he  opened  the  front  door  to  warn 
his  daughter  that  she  must  not  reveal  his 
flight.  Charlotte's  correspondence  with  her 
publisher  is  also  full  of  pathos.  It  shows 
how  keenly  she  felt  her  aloofness  from  the 
world,  which  she  could  not  overcome. 

The  story  of  Villette  is  the  real  story  of 
Charlotte's  experiences  in  a  Brussels  board- 
ing school,  where  she  first  tasted  the 
delights  of  literary  study  and  her  genius 
first  found  adequate  expression.  The  orig- 

[73] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

inal  draft  of  this  novel  was  called  'The 
Professor.  Charlotte  knew  that  it  contained 
good  material.  So,  after  the  death  of  her 
sisters,  she  took  up  the  subject,  and  with 
all  her  mature  power  produced  Villette— 
one  of  those  novels  struck  off  at  a  white 
heat,  like  George  Sand's  Indiana  or  Bal- 
zac's Seraphita.  The  story  is  largely  auto- 
biographical, but  the  episodes  of  Charlotte's 
life  are  touched  with  romance  when  they 
appear  as  the  experiences  of  Lucy  Snow, 
the  forlorn  English  girl  in  the  Continental 
school,  among  people  of  alien  natures  and 
strange  speech. 

In  Shirley,  Charlotte  Bronte  revealed 
much  genuine  humor  in  the  malicious  por- 
traits of  the  three  curates,  who  were  drawn 
from  real  life.  In  fact,  throughout  her 
books  one  will  find  most  of  the  characters 
sketched  from  real  people.  Hence,  if  one 
reads  the  story  of  her  life  he  can  trace  her 
from  her  return  from  her  Continental  life 
down  through  the  cruel  years  almost  to  the 
end.  Back  she  came  to  her  gloomy  home 
from  Brussels  only  to  watch  in  succession 
the  lingering  death  of  her  brother  and  her 
two  sisters.  Think  of  these  three  sisters, 
two  marked  for  sure  and  early  death,  labor- 
ing at  literary  work  every  day  with  the 

[74] 


CHARLOTTE  BRONTE'S  GREAT  NOVELS 

passion  and  intensity  that  come  to  few 
men.  Think  of  Emily,  the  eldest,  with 
fierce  pride  refusing  help  to  climb  the 
steep  stairway  of  the  parsonage  home  when 
her  strength  was  almost  spent  and  her  rack- 
ing cough  struck  cold  on  the  hearts  of  her 

O  O 

sisters.  And  think  of  Charlotte  in  her  ter- 
rible grief  turning  to  ficlion  as  the  only 
resource  from  unbearable  woe  and  loneli- 
ness. It  is  one  of  the  great  tragedies  of 
literature,  but  out  of  it  came  the  flowering 
of  a  brilliant  genius. 


[75] 


<CADAM  BEDE"AND"THE  MILL  ON  THE 
FLOSS"— HER  EARLY  STORIES  ARE  RICH 
IN  CHARACTER  SKETCHES,  WITH  MUCH 
PATHOS  AND  HUMOR. 

GEORGE  ELIOT  is  a  novelist  in  a  class  by 
herself.  She  never  impressed  me  as 
a  natural  story-teller,  save  when  she  lived 
over  again  that  happy  girlhood  which  served 
to  relieve  the  sadness  of  her  mature  life. 
In  parts  of  Adam  Eede  and  throughout 
'The  Mill  on  the  Floss  she  seems  to  tell  her 
stories  as  though  she  really  enjoyed  the 
work.  All  the  scenes  of  her  beautiful  girl- 
hood in  the  pleasant  Warwickshire  country, 
when  she  drove  through  the  pleasant  sweet- 
scented  lanes  and  enjoyed  the  lovely  views 
that  she  has  made  immortal  in  her  books- 
these  she  dwelt  upon,  and  with  the  touch 
of  poetry  that  redeemed  the  austerity  of 
her  nature  she  makes  them  live  again,  even 

[76] 


GEORGE  ELIOT  IN  1864 

FROM  THE  ETCHING  BY  MR.  PAUL  RAJON— DRAWN  BY 

MR.  FREDERICK  BURTON— FROM  THE  FRONTISPIECE 

TO  THE  FIRST  EDITION  OF  "GEORGE  ELIOT'S 

LIFE,"  BY  HER  HUSBAND,  J.  W.  CROSS 


GEORGE  ELIOT'S  Two  GREAT  NOVELS 

for  us  in  an  alien  land.  So,  too,  the  Eng- 
lish rustics  live  for  us  in  her  pages  with 
the  same  deathless  force  as  the  villagers  in 
Hardy's  novels  of  Wessex  life.  And  George 
Eliot  and  Thomas  Hardy  are  the  two  Eng- 
lish writers  who  have  made  these  villagers, 
with  their  peculiar  dialed:  and  their  insular 
prejudices,  serve  the  purpose  of  the  Greek 
chorus  in  warning  the  reader  of  the  fate 
that  hangs  over  their  characters. 

Of  all  English  novelists,  George  Eliot 
was  probably  the  best  equipped  in  minute 
and  accurate  scholarship.  Trained  as  few 
college  graduates  are  trained,  she  was  im- 
pelled for  several  years  to  take  up  the  study 
of  German  metaphysics.  Her  mind,  like 
her  face,  was  masculine  in  its  strength,  and 
though  she  suffered  in  her  youth  from  per- 
sistent ill-health,  she  conquered  this  in  her 
maturity  and  wrought  with  passionate  ardor 
at  all  her  literary  tasks.  So  keen  was  her 
conscience  that  she  often  defeated  her  own 
ends  by  undue  labor,  as  in  the  preparation 
for  Romola,  whose  historical  background 
swamps  the  story. 

Above  all  she  was  a  preacher  of  a  stern 
morality.  She  laid  down  the  moral  law 
that  selfishness,  like  sin,  corrodes  the  best 
nature,  and  that  the  only  happiness  lies 

[77] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

in  absolute  forgetfulness  of  self  and  in 
working  to  make  others  happy.  Thus  all 
her  books  are  full  of  little  sermons  on  life, 
preached  with  so  much  force  that  they 
cannot  fail  to  make  a  profound  impression 
even  upon  the  careless  reader. 

George  Eliot  impresses  one  as  a  very 
sad  woman,  with  an  eager  desire  to  recap- 
ture the  lost  religious  faith  of  her  happy, 
unquestioning  childhood  and  a  still  more 
passionate  desire  to  believe  in  that  immor- 
tality which  her  cold  agnostic  creed  rejected 
as  illogical.  It  was  pitiful,  this  strong- 
minded  woman  reaching  out  for  the  things 
that  less-endowed  women  accept  without 
question.  It  was  even  more  pitiful  to  see 
her,  with  her  keen  moral  sense,  violate  all 
the  conventions  of  English  law  and  society 
in  order  to  take  up  life  with  the  man  who 
stimulated  her  mind  and  actually  made  her 
one  of  the  greatest  of  English  novelists. 

Left  alone,  it  is  very  doubtful  whether 
George  Eliot  ever  would  have  found  her- 
self, ever  would  have  developed  that  mine 
of  reminiscence  which  produced  those  per- 
fect early  stories  of  English  country  life. 
To  George  Henry  Lewes,  the  man  for 
whose  love  and  companionship  she  incurred 
social  ostracism,  readers  in  a]1  English- 

[78! 


GEORGE  ELIOT'S  Two  GREAT  NOVELS 

speaking  countries  owe  a  great  debt  of  grat- 
itude, for  it  was  his  wise  counsel  and  his 
constant  stimulus  and  encouragement  which 

O 

resulted  in  making  George  Eliot  a  writer 
of  fine  novels  instead  of  an  essayist  on 
ethical  and  religious  subjects.  It  detracts 
little  from  this  debt  that  Lewes  was  also 
responsible  for  the  stimulus  of  George 
Eliot's  bent  toward  philosophical  specula- 
tion and  to  that  cold  if  clear  scientific 
thought,  which  spoiled  parts  of  Middle- 
march  and  ruined  Daniel  Deronda. 

Marian  Evans  was  born  at  Ashbury  farm 
in  Warwickshire  in  1819  and  died  in  1880. 
Her  father  was  the  agent  for  a  large  estate, 
and  the  happiest  hours  of  her  girlhood 
were  spent  in  driving  about  the  country 
with  him.  Those  keen  eyes  which  saw  so 
deeply  into  human  nature  were  early  trained 
to  observe  all  the  traits  of  the  English 
rustic,  and  those  childish  impressions  gave 
vitality  to  her  humorous  characters.  Before 
she  was  ten  years  old  Marian  had  read  Scott 
and  Lamb,  as  well  as  Pilgrim's  Progress  and 
Rasselas.  When  thirteen  years  old  she 
revealed  unusual  musical  gifts.  She  had 
the  misfortune  at  seventeen  to  lose  her 
mother,  and  for  years  after  she  managed 
her  father's  house. 

[79] 


MODERN  ENGLISHBOOKS  OF  POWER 

Evidently  the  old  farmer,  whom  his 
daughter  has  sketched  with  loving  hand  in 
Adam  Bede,  took  great  pride  in  the  mental 
superiority  of  his  daughter,  for  he  hired 
tutors  for  her  in  Latin,  Greek,  Italian  and 
German.  All  four  languages  she  mastered 
as  few  college  men  master  them.  She  read 

O 

everything,  both  old  and  new,  and  her 
intimacy  with  the  wife  of  Charles  Bray  of 
Coventry  led  her  to  refuse  to  go  to  church. 
This  free  thinking  angered  her  father  and 
caused  him  to  demand  that  she  leave  his 
house.  After  three  weeks  her  love  and  her 
keen  sense  of  duty  led  her  to  conform  to 
her  father's  wishes  and  to  resume  the 
church-going, which  in  his  eyes  was  a  part 
of  life  that  could  not  be  dropped. 

But  that  early  departure  from  the  estab- 
lished religion  carried  her  into  the  field  of 
German  skepticism.  She  translated  Strauss' 
Life  of  Jesus.  For  three  years  her  studies 
were  interrupted  by  the  serious  illness  of 
her  father.  When  he  died  she  went  to 
Geneva  and  remained  on  the  Continent  a 
year.  Then  she  came  home  and  took  up 
her  residence  with  the  Brays.  The  devel- 
opment of  her  mind  was  very  rapid.  She 
served  for  some  time  as  editor  of  the 
WESTMINSTER  REVIEW.  She  then  formed 

[80] 


S    « 


GEORGE  ELIOT'S  Two  GREAT  NOVELS 

a  strong  friendship  with  Herbert  Spencer, 
and  through  Spencer  she  met  George 
Henry  Lewes,  who  made  a  special  study 
of  Goethe  and  the  German  philosophers, 
and  who  was  the  editor  of  the  LEADER,  the 
organ  of  the  Free  Thinkers. 

Lewes  and  Marian  Evans  soon  became 
all  the  world  to  each  other,  but  Lewes  had 
an  insane  wife,  and  the  foolish  law  of  Eng- 
land forbade  him  to  get  a  divorce  or  to 
marry  again.  So  the  two  decided  to  live 
together  and  to  be  man  and  wife  in  every- 
thing except  the  sanction  of  the  law.  The 
result  was  disastrous  for  a  time  to  the 
woman.  There  is  no  question  that  the  social 
isolation  that  resulted  hurt  her  deeply. 
Her  close  friends  like  Spencer  remained 
loyal,  and  her  husband  was  always  the  de- 
voted lover  as  well  as  the  ideal  companion. 

Two  years  after  this  new  connection 
Lewes  induced  his  wife  to  try  fiction.  Her 
first  story  was  T'/ie  Sad  Adventures  of  the 
Rev.  Amos  Barton  which  was  followed  by 
Janet's  Repentance.  These  stones  appeared 
under  the  pen  name  of  George  Eliot,  which 
she  never  relinquished.  Gathered  into  book 
form  under  the  title  Scenes  From  Clerical 
Life,  these  stories  in  a  minor  key  made 
a  profound  impression  on  Charles  Dickens, 

[81] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

who  divined  they  were  the  work  of  a  woman 
of  unusual  gifts. 

The  praise  of  Lewes  and  the  apprecia- 
tion of  Dickens  and  other  experts  gave 
great  stimulus  to  her  mind,  and  she  pro- 
duced Adam  Bede,  perhaps  her  best  work, 
which  had  a  great  success.  In  the  follow- 
ing year  came  I'/ie  Mill  on  the  Floss,  an 
even  greater  success.  Then  in  quick  suc- 
cession came  the  other  early  novels,  Silas 
Marner,  Romola  and  Felix  Holt.  A  break 
of  six  years  follows,  and  then  came  Middle- 
march  and  Daniel  Deronda. 

Lewes  died  in  1 878,  and  two  years  later 
this  woman,  almost  exhausted  by  her  tre- 
mendous literary  labors,  married  J.W.Cross, 
an  old  friend,  but,  like  Charlotte  Bronte, 
she  had  only  short  happiness,  for  she  died 
in  the  following  year.  The  nations  praised 
her,  but  she  never  recovered  from  the  shock 
of  Lewes' death. 

Of  George  Eliot's  work  the  things  that 

O  O 

impress  one  most  are  her  fine  descriptions 
of  natural  scenes,  her  keen  analyses  of  char- 
acter and  her  many  little  moral  sermons 
on  life  and  conduct.  With  an  abnormal 
conscience  and  a  keen  sense  of  duty,  life 
proved  very  hard  for  her.  This  is  reflected 
in  the  somberness  of  her  stories  and  in  the 

[82] 


GEORGE  ELIOT'S  Two  GREAT  NOVELS 

dread  atmosphere  of  fate  that  hangs  over 
her  characters.  But  over  against  this  must 
be  placed  her  joy  in  depicting  the  rustic 
character  and  humor  and  her  delight  in 
reproducing  the  scenes  of  her  childhood 
in  one  of  the  most  beautiful  counties  of 
England. 

Herbert  Spencer,  who  was  long  asso- 
ciated with  George  Eliot,  and  for  a  time 
contemplated  the  possibility  of  a  union 
with  that  remarkable  woman,  pays  her  a 
high  tribute  in  'The  Study  of  Sociology.  After 
explaining  the  origin  in  women  of  the 
ability  to  distinguish  quickly  the  passing 
feelings  of  those  around,  he  says:  "Ordi- 
narily, this  feminine  faculty,  showing  itself 
in  an  aptitude  forguessing  the  state  of  mind 
through  the  external  signs,  ends  simply 
in  intuitions  formed  without  assignable 
reasons;  butwhen,  as  happens  in  rare  cases, 
there  is  joined  with  it  skill  in  psychological 
analysis,  there  results  in  extremely  remark- 
able ability  to  interpret  the  mental  states 
of  others.  Of  this  ability  we  have  a  living 
example  (George  Eliot)  never  hitherto 
paralleled  among  women,  and  in  but  few, 
if  any,  cases  exceeded  among  men." 

Perhaps  the  reader  who  does  not  know 
George  Eliot  would  do  well  to  begin  with 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

'The  Mill  on  the  Floss,  her  finest  work,  which 
is  full  of  humor,  lovely  pictures  of  English 
rural  life  and  an  analysis  of  soul  in  Maggie 
Tolliver  that  has  never  been  surpassed. 
Yet  the  end  is  cruel  and  unnatural,  as  hard 
and  as  unsatisfying  as  the  author's  own 
religious  creed.  Next  v^&Adam  Bede,one 
of  the  saddest  books  in  all  literature,  with 
comic  relief  in  Mrs.  Poyser,  one  of  the 
most  humorous  charactersinEnglish  fiction. 

George  Eliot  drew  Dinah  Morris  from 
her  favorite  aunt,  who  was  a  Methodist 
exhorter,  and  the  power  and  spontaneity 
of  this  novel  came  from  the  sharpness  and 
clearness  of  her  early  impressions,  joined 
to  her  love  of  living  over  again  her  girl- 
hood days,  before  doubt  had  clouded  her 
sky.  Also  read  Silas  Marner  with  its  per- 
fed:  picture  of  Raveloe,"an  English  village 
where  many  of  the  old  echoes  lingered, 
undrowned  by  new  voices."  These  descrip- 
tions are  instinct  with  poetry,  and  they 
affect  one  like  Wordsworth's  best  poems  or 
like  Tennyson's  vignettes  of  rural  life.  The 
pale  weaver  of  Raveloe  will  always  remain 
as  one  of  the  great  characters  in  English 
fiction. 

Of  George  Eliot's  more  elaborate  work 
it  is  impossible  to  speak  in  entire  praise. 

[84] 


GEORGE  ELIOT'S  Two  GREAT  NOVELS 

If  you  have  the  leisure,  and  these  books 
I  have  named  please  you,  then  by  all  means 
read  Romola,  which  is  a  remarkable  study 
of  the  degeneracy  of  a  young  Greek  and 
of  the  noble  strivings  of  a  great-hearted 
woman.  The  pictures  of  Florence  in  the 
time  of  Savonarola  are  splendid,  but  they 
smell  of  the  lamp.  Middlemarch  is  also 
worth  careful  study  for  its  fine  analysis  of 
character  and  motive.  In  all  George  Eliot's 
books  her  characters  develop  before  our 
eyes,  and  this  is  especially  true  in  this  elab- 
orate study  of  the  pathos  and  the  tragedy 
of  human  life. 

George  Eliot  wrote  little  poetry,  but  one 
piece  may  be  commended  to  careful  atten- 
tion, "The  Choir  Invisible."  It  sums  up 
with  impassioned  force  her  ethical  creed, 
which  she  put  in  these  fine  lines: 

Oh,  may  I  join  the  choir  invisible 

Of  those  immortal  dead  who  live  again 

In  minds  made  better  by  their  presence :  live 

In  pulses  stirred  to  generosity, 

In  deeds  of  daring  rectitude,  in  scorn 

For  miserable  aims  that  end  in  self.      *     * 

This  is  life  to  dome 

Which  martyred  men  have  made  more  glorious 
For  us  who  strive  to  follow.     May  I  reach 
That  purest  heaven,  be  to  other  souls 
The  cup  of  strength  in  some  great  agony, 

[85] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

Enkindle  generous  ardor,  feed  pure  love. 
Beget  the  smiles  that  have  no  cruelty- 
Be  the  sweet  presence  of  a  good  diffused, 
And  in  diffusion  ever  more  intense. 
So  shall  I  join  the  choir  invisible, 
Whose  music  is  the  gladness  of  the  world. 

This  was  the  creed  of  George  Eliot, 
which  she  preached  in  her  books  and  which 
she  followed  in  her  life.  This  was  the  only 
hope  of  immortality  that  she  cherished— to 
"live  again"  in  minds  that  she  stimulated. 


[86] 


RUSKIN 

THE  APOSTLE  OF 
ART 

His  WORK  As  ART  CRITIC  AND  SOCIAL 
REFORMER— BEST  BOOKS  ARE"MODERN 
PAINTERS,""THE  SEVEN   LAMPS"  AND 
"THE  STONES  OF  VENICE." 

TOHN  RUSKIN  deserves  a  place  among  the 
J  great  English  writers  of  the  last  century, 
not  only  because  of  his  superb  style  and 
the  amount  of  his  work,  but  because  he 
was  the  first  to  encourage  the  study  of  art 
and  nature  among  the  people.  So  enor- 
mous have  been  the  strides  made  in  the 
last  twenty  vears  in  popular  knowledge  of 
art  and  architeclure,and  so  great  the  growth 
of  interest  in  the  beauties  of  nature  that  it 
is  difficult  to  appreciate  that  a  little  over  a 
half  century  ago,  when  Ruskin  first  came 
into  prominence  as  a  writer,  the  English 
public  was  densely  ignorant  of  art,  and  was 
equally  ignorant  of  the  world  of  pleasure  to 
be  derived  from  beautiful  scenery. 

[87] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

It  was  Ruskin's  great  service  to  the  world 
that  he  opened  the  eyes  of  the  public  to 
the  glories  of  the  art  of  all  countries,  and 
that  he  also  revealed  the  wonders  of  archi- 
tecture. Many  critics  have  laid  bare  his 
infirmities  as  a  critic,  but  a  man  of  colder 
blood  and  less  emotional  nature  would 
never  have  reached  the  large  public  to 
which  Ruskin  appealed.  Like  a  great  orator 
he  was  swayed  by  the  passion  of  convincing 
his  audience,  and  the  very  extravagance  of 
his  language  and  the  ardor  of  his  nature 
served  to  make  a  profound  impression 
upon  readers  who  are  not  usually  affected 
by  such  appeals  as  his. 

Ruskin  was  one  of  the  most  impractical 
men  that  ever  lived,  but  in  the  exuberance 
of  his  nature  and  in  his  rare  unselfishness 
he  started  a  dozen  social  reforms  in  Eng- 
land, any  one  of  which  should  have  given 
fame  to  its  founder.  He  gave  away  a  great 
fortune  in  gifts  to  the  public  and  in  private 
generosity.  He  founded  museums,  estab- 
lished scholarships,  tried  to  put  into  prac- 
tical working  order  his  dream  of  a  New 
Life  founded  on  the  union  of  manual  labor 
and  high  intellectual  aims,  labored  to  induce 
the  public  to  read  the  good  old  books  that 
help  one  to  make  life  worth  living. 

[88] 


JOHN  RUSKIN 

FROM  A  PHOTOGRAI-H  TAKEN  ON  JULY  20,  1882, 
BY  MESSRS.  ELLIOTT  &  FRY 


RUSKIN  THE  APOSTLE  OF  ART 

That  much  of  his  good  work  was  neu- 
tralized by  his  lack  of  common  sense 
detracts  nothing  from  the  world's  debt  to 
Ruskin.  The  simple  truth  is  that  he  was 
a  reformer  as  well  as  a  great  writer,  and 
the  very  fervor  of  his  religious  and  social 
beliefs,  his  contempt  of  mere  money  get- 
ting, his  hatred  of  falsehood,  his  boundless 
generosity  and  his  childlike  simplicity  of 
mind— all  these  traits  at  which  the  world 
laughed  lifted  Ruskin  above  the  other  men 
of  genius  of  his  time  and  placed  him  among 
the  world's  great  reformers. 

Among  this  small  body  of  men  whose 
spiritual  force  continues  to  live  in  their 
books  or  through  the  influence  of  their 
great  self-sacrifices, Ruskin  deserves  a  place, 
for  he  gave  fortune,  work  and  a  splendid 
enthusiasm  to  the  common  people's  cause. 

Ruskin's  whole  life  was  abnormal,  and 
his  early  training  served  to  accentuate  those 
weaknesses  of  mind  and  will  that  made 
failures  of  so  many  schemes  for  the  public 
good.  If  Ruskin  had  been  trained  in  the 
English  public  schools  he  would  have 
learned  common  sense  in  boyhood.  As  it 
was,  his  father  and  mother  shielded  the 
boy  in  every  way  from  all  contact  with  the 
world.  Ruskin's  father  was  a  prosperous 

[89] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

wine  merchant  with  much  culture;  his 
mother  was  a  religious  fanatic,  whose  pas- 
sion for  the  Bible  imposed  upon  her  boy 
the  daily  reading  of  the  Scriptures  and  the 
daily  memorizing  of  scores  of  verses. 

Such  training  in  most  cases  causes  a 
revolt  against  religion,  but  in  Ruskin's 
case  it  resulted  in  training  his  boyish  ear 
to  the  cadences  of  the  Bible  writers  and  in 
filling  his  mind  with  the  sublime  imagery 
of  the  prophets,  with  the  result  that  when 
he  began  to  write  he  had  already  formed 
a  style,  the  richest  and  most  varied  of  the 
last  century. 

The  boy  was  a  mental  prodigy,  for  he 
taught  himself  to  read  when  four  years  old, 
and  at  five  he  had  devoured  hundreds  of 
books  and  was  already  writing  poems  and 
plays.  At  ten,  when  he  had  his  first  tutor, 
his  knowledge  was  wide  and  he  had  become 
a  passionate  lover  of  natural  scenery,  as 
well  as  no  mean  artist  with  pen  and  pencil. 
Scott's  novels  and  Byron's  Childe  Harold 
formed  much  of  his  reading  at  a  time  when 
most  boys  are  content  with  the  stories 
of  Ballantyne  or  Mayne  Reid.  The  range 
of  his  mental  activity  until  he  entered 
Oxford  at  eighteen  was  very  wide.  He  was 
interested  in  mineralogy,  meteorology, 


RUSKIN  THE  APOSTLE  OF  ART 

mathematics,  drawing  and  painting.  What 
probably  expanded  his  mind  more  than 
all  else  was  the  education  of  travel.  His 
father  spent  about  half  his  time  journeying 
through  England  and  the  Continent  in 
an  old-fashioned  chaise  and  John  always 
shared  in  these  expeditions.  At  Oxford 
he  competed  for  the  Newdigate  prize  in 
poetry,  and  after  being  twice  defeated  won 
the  coveted  honor.  He  never  gained  any 
high  scholarship,  but  he  received  valuable 
training  in  writing. 

There  is  no  space  here  to  chronicle  more 
than  a  few  of  his  many  activities  after  leav- 
ing college.  H  e  first  came  into  prominence 
by  his  passionate  defense  of  the  painter 
Turner  against  the  art  critics,  and  his  study 
of  Turner  led  him  to  adopt  art  criticism 
as  his  life  work.  At  twenty-three  years  of 
age,  when  most  youths  are  puzzled  about 
their  vocation,  Ruskin  had  completed  the 
first  volume  of  Modern  Painters ',  the  pub- 
lication of  which  gave  him  fame  and  made 
him  a  social  lion  in  London.  Other  vol- 
umes of  this  great  work  followed  swiftly 
and  caused  a  great  commotion  in  the  world 
of  art  and  letters  because  of  the  radical 
views  of  the  author  and  the  remarkable 
qualities  of  his  style. 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

This  was  followed  by  'The  Seven  Lamps 
ofArchite£ture,\n  which  Ruskin  expounded 
his  radical  views  on  this  kindred  art;  The 
Stones  of  Venice,  an  eloquent  book  enforc- 
ing the  argument  that  Gothic  architecture 
sprang  from  a  pure  national  faith  and  the 
domestic  virtues;  Kings  Treasuries,  a  noble 
plea  for  good  books;  Fors  Clavigera,  a 
series  of  ninety-six  parts  published  in  eight 
volumes,  the  record  of  his  social  experi- 
ments; Preterita,  one  of  the  most  charming 
books  of  youthful  reminiscences  in  any 
language,  and  many  others.  Ruskin's  men- 
tal activity  was  enormous.  He  had  to  his 
credit  in  his  fifty-five  active  years  no  less 
than  seventy-two  volumes  and  one  hundred 
magazine  articles,  as  well  as  thousands  of 
lectures. 

This  outline  sketch  of  Ruskin's  life 
would  be  incomplete  without  mention  of 
the  great  sorrows  that  darkened  his  days 
but  gave  eloquence  to  his  writings.  The 
first  was  the  desertion  of  his  wife,  who 
married  the  painter  Millais,  and  the  second 
was  the  loss  by  death  of  Rose  La  Touche, 
a  beautiful  Irish  girl  whom  he  had  known 
from  childhood.  She  refused  to  marry 
him  because  of  their  differences  of  religion; 
even  refused  to  see  him  in  her  fatal  illness 

[92] 


JOHN  RUSKIN 

FROM  THE  SEMI-ROMANTIC  PORTRAIT  BY 
SIR  JOHN  E.  MILLAIS 


RUSKIN  THE  APOSTLE  OF  ART 

unless  he  could  say  that  he  loved  God  bet- 
ter than  he  loved  her.  Her  death  brought 
bitter  despair  to  Ruskin,  but  the  world 
profited  by  it,  for  grief  gave  his  work 
maturity  and  force.  The  last  ten  years  of 
Ruskin's  life  were  spent  at  his  beautiful 
home  at  Brantwood,  surrounded  by  the 
pictures  that  he  loved  and  served  faithfully 
by  devoted  relatives. 

Ruskin's  books  are  not  to  be  read  con- 
tinuously. Many  dreary  passages  may  be 
found  in  all  of  them,  which  the  judicious 
reader  skips.  But  his  best  works  are  more 
full  of  intellectual  stimulus  than  those  of 
any  writer  of  his  time  with  the  single 
exception  ofCarlyle.  ModernPainters over- 
flows with  the  enthusiasm  of  a  lover  of 
art  and  of  nature  who  preaches  the  gospel 
of  sincerity  and  truth.  It  is  marked,  like  all 
his  work,by  eloquentdigressions  on  human 
life  and  conduct,  for  Ruskin  held  that 
the  finest  art  was  simply  the  flowering  of  a 
great  soul  nurtured  on  all  that  was  highest 
and  best.  I'he  Seven  Lamps  does  for  archi- 
tecture what  his  first  work  did  for  painting. 
The  book  is  written  in  more  ornate  style 
than  any  other,  but  he  who  loves  impas- 
sioned prose  will  find  many  specimens  here 
that  can  only  by  equaled  in  De  Quincey's 

[93] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

best  work.  Read  the  peroration  of  the 
"Lamp  of  Sacrifice"  and  you  will  not  need 
to  be  told  that  this  is  the  finest  tribute  to 
the  work  of  the  builders  of  the  mediaeval 
cathedral.  Here  is  a  part  of  this  eloquent 
passage: 

It  is  to  far  happier,  far  higher  exaltation  that  we 
owe  those  fair  fronts  of  variegated  mosaic,  charged 
with  wild  fancies  and  dark  hosts  of  imagery  thicker 
and  quainter  than  ever  filled  the  depth  of  midsummer 
dream;  those  vaulted  gates,  trellised  with  close  leaves; 
those  window  labyrinths  of  twisted  tracery  and  starry 
light;  those  misty  masses  of  multitudinous  pinnacle  and 
diademed  tower;  the  only  witnesses,  perhaps,  that 
remain  to  us  of  the  faith  and  fear  of  nations.  All  else 
for  which  the  builders  sacrificed  has  passed  away.  * 
*  *  But  of  them  and  their  life  and  their  toil  upon 
earth,  one  reward,  one  evidence,  is  left  to  us  in  those 
great  heaps  of  deep-wrought  stone.  They  have  taken 
with  them  to  the  grave  their  powers,  their  honors  and 
their  errors;  but  they  have  left  us  their  adoration. 

No  space  is  left  here  to  mention  in  detail 
Ruskin's  other  works,  but  Unto  'This  Lasf, 
The  Stones  of  Venice,  Sesame  and  Lilies  and 
The  Crown  of  Wild  Olive  may  be  com- 
mended as  well  worth  careful  reading.  Also 
Preterita  is  alive  with  noble  passages,  such 
as  the  pen-picture  of  the  view  from  the 
Dale  in  the  Alps,  or  of  the  Rhone  below 
Geneva.  Read  also  Ruskin's  description 
of  Turner's  "Slave  Ship"  or  the  impressive 


[94] 


RUSKIN  THE  APOSTLE  OF  ART 

passage  on  the  mental  slavery  of  the  modern 
workman  in  the  sixth  chapter  of  the  second 
volume  of  'The  Stones  of  Venice.  Read  these 
things  and  you  will  have  no  doubt  of  the 
genius  of  Ruskin  or  of  his  command  of  the 
finest  impassioned  prose  in  the  English 
language. 


[95] 


TENNYSON 
LEADS  THE  VICTORIAN 

WRITERS 

THE  POET  WHO  VOICED  THE  ASPIRATIONS 
OF  His  AGE— "LOCKSLEY  HALL,""!N 
MEMORIAM"AND  "THE  IDYLLS  OF  THE 
KING"  AMONG  His  BEST  WORKS. 

OF  all  the  great  English  writers  of  the 
Victorian  age  it  is  probable  that  the 
next  century  will  give  the  foremost  place 
to  Tennyson.  Better  than  any  other  poet 
of  his  day,,  he  stands  as  a  type  of  the  Eng- 
lish people  in  obedience  to  law,  in  strong 
religious  faith, in  splendid  imaginative  force 
and  in  a  certain  unyielding  cast  of  mind 
that  made  him  bide  his  time  during  the 
dark  years  when  he  was  bitterly  criticized 
or  coldly  neglected.  Tennyson  had  to  the 
full  the  poet's  temperament,  but  he  had  also 
a  superb  physique,  which  carried  him  into 
his  eighty-fourth  year.  From  a  boy  he  was 
a  lover  of  nature,  and  in  nearly  every  poem 
that  he  wrote  are  found  many  proofs  of  his 

[96] 


ALFRED,  LORD  TENNYSON 

AFTER  AN  ENGRAVING  BY  G.  J.  STODART  FROM  A 
PHOTOGRAPH  BY  J.  MAYALL 


TENNYSON  LEADS  VICTORIAN  WRITERS 

close  observation  in  English  woods  and 
fields.  Through  a  period  of  general  skep- 
ticism he  kept  unimpaired  his  strong  faith 
in  God  and  in  immortality  that  lends  so 
much  force  to  his  best  verse. 

Tennyson's  genius  found  its  natural 
expression  in  verse,  and  it  is  his  distinction 
that  while  he  explored  many  realms  of 
thought  he  was  always  clear  and  always 
musical.  Browning  had  more  passion, but  it 
was  the  misfortune  of  the  author  of  The 
Ring  and  the  Book  that  he  could  not  refrain 
from  a  cramped  and  obscure  style  of  verse 
that  makes  much  of  his  work  very  hard 
reading.  Many  Browning  societies  have 
been  formed  to  study  the  works  of  the 
poet  whom  they  are  proud  to  call  master; 
but  Tennyson  needs  no  societies,  as  the 
man  in  the  street  and  the  woman  whose 
soul  is  troubled  can  understand  every  line 
he  has  written.  Nor  is  Tennyson  lacking 
in  passion,  as  any  one  may  see  by  reading 
Locks  ley  Hall  or  Maud. 

Tennyson  summed  up  in  his  poetry  all 
the  spiritual  aspiration  and  the  eager  search 
for  knowledge  of  his  time.  He  explored 
all  domains  of  thought,  and  he  enriched 
his  verse  with  the  fruit  of  his  studies.  All 
the  great  elemental  forces  are  found  in  his 

[97] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

poems:  he  is  the  laureate  of  love  and  sor- 
row, of  grief  and  aspiration.  Throughout 
his  verse  runs  the  great  natural  law  that 
the  man  who  is  not  pure  in  heart  can  never 
see  the  glory  of  the  poet's  vision. 

The  purity  of  his  own  life  was  reflected 
in  his  verse,  just  as  the  mad  license  and  the 
furious  self-indulgence  of  Byron  are  mir- 
rored in  Don  Juan,  Manfred  and  Cain. 
Even  to  extreme  old  age  Tennyson  pre- 
served that  high  poetic  faculty  which  he 
manifested  in  early  youth.  One  of  his  lat- 
est poems,  Crossing  the  Bar,  is  also  one  of 
the  finest  in  the  language,  breathing  the 
old  man's  assurance  of  a  life  beyond  the 
grave  and  a  reunion  with  the  dear  friend  of 
his  youth,  whom  he  mourned  and  immor- 
talized in  In  Memoriam. 

Alfred  Tennyson  had  one  of  the  finest 
lives  in  the  roll  of  English  authors.  He  was 
born  in  i  809  and  lived  to  1 892.  He  spent 
his  early  years  in  one  of  the  most  beautiful 
parts  of  Lincolnshire.  He  enjoyed  the 
personal  training  of  his  father,  a  very  ac- 
complished clergyman,  and  much  of  his 
boyhood  and  youth  was  spent  in  the  open 
air.  In  this  way  he  absorbed  that  knowl- 
edge of  birds  and  animals,  trees  and  flowers 
and  all  the  aspecls  of  nature  which  is 

[98] 


TENNYSON  LEADS  VICTORIAN  WRITERS 

reflected  in  his  verse.  As  a  youth  he 
experimented  in  many  styles  of  verse,  and 
when  only  eighteen  he  issued,  with  his 
brother  Charles,  Poems  by  T'wo  Brothers. 
The  next  year  he  and  Charles  entered 
Trinity  College,  Cambridge.  There  they 
received  the  greatest  impulse  toward  cul- 
ture in  a  society  of  undergraduates  known 
asthe"Apostles."  Its  membership  included 
Thackeray,  Trench,  Spedding,  Monckton 
Milnes  and  Alfred  and  Arthur  Henry 
Hallam,  sons  of  the  famous  author  of 
The  Middle  Ages. 

In  his  second  year  at  college  Tennyson 
won  the  Chancellor's  gold  medal  with  his 
prize  poem,  'Timbuctoo,  and  in  the  following 
year  he  published  his  first  volume,  Poems, 
Chiefly  Lyrical.  He  left  college  without  a 
degree,  and  in  1833  he  issued  another  vol- 
ume of  poems  which  contained  some  of  his 
best  work—  77;  <?  Lady  of  Shalott,  T'he  Lotos 
Eater  s^The  Palace  of  Art  and  A  Dream  of 
Fair  Women.  Any  one  of  these  poems  if 
issued  to-day  would  make  the  reputation 
of  a  poet,  but  this  book  made  little  im- 
pression on  the  Victorian  public  which  had 
lost  its  taste  for  poetry  and  was  devoted 
mainly  to  prose  ficlion.  The  world  has  yet 
to  catch  the  note  of  this  master  singer. 

[99] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

In  1837  Arthur  Hallam,  Tennyson's 
friend  and  other  self,  the  one  man  who 
predicted  that  he  would  be  the  greatest 
poet  of  his  age,  died  suddenly  in  Vienna 
while  traveling  abroad.  The  shock  made 
a  profound  impression  on  Tennyson.  For 
ten  years  he  put  forth  no  work.  Finally, 
in  1842,  he  issued  two  volumes  of  poems 
that  at  once  caught  the  public  fancy. 
Among  the  poems  that  brought  him  fame 
were  Locksley  Hall,  Lady  Godiva,  Ulysses, 
The  Two  Voices  and  Morte  d'  Arthur.  The 
latter  was  the  seed  of  the  splendid  Idylls 
of  the  King.  Five  years  later  he  published 
The  Princess,  with  its  beautiful  songs,  and 
three  years  after  In  Memoriam  the  greatest 
elegiac  poem  in  the  language,  in  which  he 
lamented  the  fate  of  Arthur  Hallam  and 
poured  forth  his  own  grief  over  this  irrep- 
arable loss.  In  the  same  year  he  married 
Miss  Emily  Sellwood,  who  made  his  home 
a  haven  of  rest  and  of  whom  he  once  said 
that  with  her  "the  peace  of  God  came  into 
my  life." 

Maud,  his  most  dramatic  poem,  was 
issued  in  1855.  As  early  as  1859  he  pub- 
lished the  first  part  of  The  Idylls  of  the 
King,  but  it  was  not  until  1872  that  the 
complete  sequence  of  the  Idylls  was  given 

[100] 


rr 


/D 


FACSIMILE  OF 

TENNYSON'S  ORIGINAL  MANUSCRIPT  OF 
"CROSSING  THE  BAR" 

COPYRIGHT  IJY  TUB  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 


TENNYSON  LEADS  VICTORIAN  WRITERS 

to  the  public.  These  Arthurian  legends 
are  cast  by  Tennyson  in  his  most  musical 
blank  verse,  and  he  has  given  to  them  a 
tinge  of  mysticism  that  seems  to  lift  them 
above  the  everyday  world  into  a  realm  of 
pure  romance  and  chivalry. 

Enoch  Arden,  a  domestic  idyl,  written  in 
1 864,  made  a  great  hit.  It  was  followed  by 
several  plays— Queen  Mary,  Harold,  Eecket 
and  others— all  finely  written,  but  none 
appealing  to  the  great  public.  Up  to  his 
last  years  Tennyson  remained  the  real 
laureate  of  his  people,  his  words  always 
tinged  with  the  fire  of  inspiration.  Only 
three  years  before  his  death  he  wrote 
Crossing  the  Bar,  a  poem  which  met  with 
instant  response  from  the  English-speaking 
world  because  of  its  signs  of  courage  in  the 
face  of  death  and  its  proofs  of  steadfast 
faith  in  the  life  beyond  the  grave. 

No  adequate  estimate  of  Tennyson's 
work  can  be  made  in  the  small  space 
allotted  to  this  article.  All  that  can  be  done 
is  to  mention  a  few  of  his  best  works  and 
to  quote  a  few  of  his  stirring  lines.  If  the 
reader  will  study  these  poems  he  will  be 
pretty  sure  to  read  more  of  Tennyson.  To 
my  mind,  Locksley  Hall  is  Tennyson's  fin- 
est poem,  as  true  to-day  as  when  it  was 

[10!] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

written  seventy  years  ago.  The  long,  roll- 
ing, trochaic  verse,  like  the  billows  on  the 
coast  that  it  pictures,  suits  the  thought. 
The  poem  is  the  passionate  lament  of  a 
returned  soldier  from  India  over  the  mer- 
cenary marriage  of  the  cousin  whom  he 
loved.  Here  are  a  few  of  the  lines  that 
will  never  die: 

Many  a  night  I  saw  the  Pleiades,  rising  through 

the  mellow  shade. 
Glitter  like  a  swarm  of"  fireflies  tangled  in  a  silver 

braid. 
Love  took  up  the  harp  of  Life,  and  smote  on  all 

the  chords  with  might; 
Smote  the  chord  of  Self,  that,  trembling,  pass'd  in 

music  out  of  sight. 
Cursed  be  the  sickly  forms  that  err  from  honest 

Nature's  rule ! 

Cursed  be  the  gold  that  gilds  the  straiten'd  fore- 
head of  a  fool ! 
Comfort?    Comfort  scorn'd  of  devils !  this  is  truth 

the  poet  sings, 
That  a  sorrow's  crown  of  sorrow  is  remembering 

happier  things. 
But  the  jingling  of  the  guinea  helps  the  hurt  that 

Honor  feels, 
And  the  nations  do  but  murmur,  snarling  at  each 

other's  heels. 
Mated  with  a  squalid  savage-what  to  me  were  sun 

or  clime  ? 
I  the  heir  of  all  the  ages  in  the  foremost  files  of 

time. 


[102] 


TENNYSON  LEADS  VICTORIAN  WRITERS 

Not  in  vain  the  distance  beacons.    Forward,  for- 
ward, let  us  range, 

Let  the  great  world  spin  forever  down  the  ringing 
grooves  of  change. 

Thro'  the  shadow  of  the  globe  we  sweep  into  the 
younger  day : 

Better  fifty  years  of  E*rope  than  a  cycle  of 
Cathay. 

It  would  be  difficult  among  the  poets  of 
the  last  century  to  parallel  these  passages 
for  their  imaginative  sweep  and  magnetic 
appeal  to  the  reader.  The  new  criticism 
thatdisparagesTennyson  and  raises  Brown- 
ing to  the  seventh  heaven  calls  Locksley 
Hall  old-fashioned  and  sentimental,  but  to 
me  it  is  the  greatest  poem  of  its  age.  Next 
to  this  I  would  place  In  Memoriam,  which 
has  never  received  its  just  recognition. 
Readers  of  Taine  will  recall  his  flippant 
Gaelic  comment  on  Tennyson's  conven- 
tional but  cold  words  of  lament.  Nothing, 
it  seems  to  me,  is  further  from  the  truth. 
The  many  beautiful  lines  in  the  poem 
depict  the  changing  moods  of  the  man  who 
mourned  for  his  dead  and  finally  found 
comfort  in  the  words  of  the  Bible— the  only 
source  of  comfort  in  this  world  for  the 
sorely  wounded  heart.  The  whole  poem, 
as  his  son  Hallam  says,  emphasizes  the 
poet's  belief"in  an  omnipotent  and  all- 

[I03] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

loving  God,  who  has  revealed  himself 
through  the  highest  self-sacrificing  love 
in  the  freedom  of  the  human  will  and  in 
the  immortality  of  the  soul." 

The  meter  of  In  Memoriam  serves  to 
fix  the  poem  in  the  memory.  It  seems  to 
fit  the  thought  with  perfect  naturalness. 
Itis  not  strange  that  Queen  Victoria  should 
have  placed  this  poem  next  to  the  Bible 
as  a  means  of  comfort  after  the  loss  of  her 
husband,  whom  she  loved  so  dearly  that 
all  the  attractions  of  power  and  wealth 
never  made  her  forget  him  a  single  day. 

I'he  Idylls  of  the  King  are  also  unappreci- 
ated in  these  days,  yet  they  contain  a  body 
of  splendid  poetry  that  cannot  be  dupli- 
cated. They  represent  the  author's  dreams 
from  early  youth,  when  his  imagination 
was  first  fired  by  old  Malory's  chronicle 
of  the  good  King  Arthur.  They  breathe 
a  chivalry  as  lofty  as  Sidney's,  and  they 
teach  many  ethical  lessons  that  it  would  do 
the  present-day  world  good  to  take  to  heart. 
These  noble  poems,  cast  in  the  most  musi- 
cal blank  verse  in  our  literature,  were  the 
work  of  thirty  years,  written  only  when 
the  poet  felt  genuine  inspiration.  They 
represent,  as  the  poet  told  his  son, "the 
dream  of  a  man  coming  into  practical  life 

[104] 


TENNYSON  LEADS  VICTORIAN  WRITERS 

and  ruined  by  one  sin.  It  is  not  the  history 
of  one  man  or  of  one  generation,  but  of  a 
whole  cycle  of  generations."  And  the  old 
poet  added  these  fine  words:  "Poetry  is  like 
shot  silk  with  many  glancing  colors.  Every 
reader  must  find  his  own  interpretation 
according  to  his  ability  and  according  to 
his  sympathy  with  the  poet." 

Other  fine  poems  of  Tennyson  which 
one  should  read  are  the  noble  Ode  on  the 
Death  of  the  Duke  of  Wellington,  Break, 
Break,  Break,  the  perfect  songs  in  'The Prin- 
cess, and  Crossing  the  Ear.  If  you  read  these 
aright  you  will  wish  to  know  more  of  Ten- 
nyson, the  poet  who  reconciled  science  and 
religion  and  kept  his  old  faith  strong  to 
the  end. 


BROWNING 

GREATEST  POET  SINCE 
SHAKESPEARE 

How  TO  GET  THE  BEST  OF  BROWNING'S 
POEMS— READ  THE  LYRICS  FIRST  AND 
THEN  TAKE  UP  THE  LONGER  AND  THE 
MORE  DIFFICULT  WORKS. 

THE  greatest  of  English  poets  since 
Shakespeare,  is  the  title  given  to 
Robert  Browning  by  many  admirers  of  rec- 
ognized ability  as  critics.  For  his  dramatic 
force  and  his  insight  into  human  nature 
there  is  no  question  that  Browning  deserves 
this  high  rank.  In  these  two  qualities  he 

D  i 

stands  above  Tennyson.  But  a  large  part 
of  his  work  is  written  in  a  style  so  crabbed 
that  it  acls  as  a  bar  to  one's  enjoyment  of 
many  fine  poems.  Only  the  most  resolute 
reader  can  go  through  Sordello  or  'The  Ring 
and  the  Book,  the  latter,  with  its  intermin- 
able discussions  of  motive  and  its  curious 
descriptions  of  half-forgotten  legal  and 
church  methods  of  the  seventeenth  cen- 

[,06] 


ROBERT  BROWNING 

FROM  A  PHOTOGRAPH  BY  HOI.LYER  AFTER  THE 
PORTRAIT  BY  G.  F.  WATTS,  R.  A. 


GREATEST  POET  SINCE  SHAKESPEARE 

tury.  If  one-half  this  long  poem  of  over 
twenty  thousand  lines  had  been  cut  out,  it 
would  have  been  vastly  improved. 

The  advocates  of  Browning  hold  that 
the  study  of  the  poet's  obscurities  is  good 
mental  discipline,  but  I  am  of  the  belief 
that  poetry,  like  music,  should  not  demand 
too  great  exertion  of  the  mind  to  appreciate 
its  beauty.  Wagner's  "Seigfried"  and  "Par- 
sifal" are  altogether  too  long  to  be  enjoyed 
thoroughly.  The  composer  would  have 
done  well  to  eliminate  a  third  of  each,  for 
as  they  are  produced  they  strain  the  atten- 
tion to  the  point  of  fatigue,  and  no  work 
of  art  should  ever  tire  its  admirers. 

I  n  the  same  way  Browning  offends  against 
this  primal  canon  of  art.  A  man  who  was 
capable  of  writing  the  most  melodious  verse, 
as  is  shown  in  some  of  his  lyrics,  he  refused 
to  put  his  thoughts  in  simple  form,  and 
often  clothed  them  in  obscurity.  The  result 
is  that  the  great  public  which  would  have 
enjoyed  his  studies  of  character  and  his 
powerful  dramatic  faculty  is  repelled  at  the 
outset  by  the  difficulties  of  understanding 
his  poems.  Browning  added  to  this  obscur- 
ity by  constant  reference  to  little-known 
authors.  This  was  not  pedantry,  any  more 
than  Milton's  use  of  classic  mythology 

[107] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

was  pedantry.  Both  men  possessed  unusual 
knowledge  of  rare  books,  and  both  were 
much  given  to  quoting  authors  who  are 
unknown  to  the  general  reading  public. 

But  with  all  these  difficulties  in  the  way, 
there  still  remains  a  body  of  verse  in  Brown- 
ing's work  which  will  richly  repay  any 
reader.  The  lyrics  and  short  poems  like 
The  Pied  Piper  of  Hamelin,  Pippa  Passes, 
Prospice,  O  Lyric  Love.,  The  Last  Ride,  One 
Word  More,  How  They  Brought  the  Good 
News,Herve  Kiel,  the  epilogue  toAsolando, 
The  Lost  Leader,  Men  and  Women,  and  A 
Soul's  Tragedy  will  give  any  reader  a  taste 
of  the  real  Browning.  If  you  like  these 
poems,  then  try  the  more  ambitious  poems 
like  A  Blot  in  the  'Scutcheon,  The  Inn  Album, 
Fifine  at  the  Fair  and  others. 

Browning,  above  all  other  English  poets, 
seems  to  have  had  the  power  of  seizing 
upon  a  character  at  a  crucial  hour  in  life 
and  laying  bare  all  the  impulses  that  im- 
pel one  to  high  achievement  or  great  self- 
sacrifice.  He  seems  always  to  have  worked 
at  the  highest  emotional  stress,  so  that  his 
words  are  surcharged  with  feeling.  In  many 
of  his  poems  this  emotional  element  is 
painful  in  its  intensity.  Character  to  him 
was  the  main  feature,  and  his  selections 

[108] 


GREATEST  POET  SINCE  SHAKESPEARE 

comprise  some  of  the  most  picturesque  in 
all  history.  That  he  was  able  to  make 
these  people  live  and  move  and  impress 
us  as  real  flesh-and-blood  human  beings 
shows  the  great  creative  power  of  the  man, 
who  ought  to  have  written  some  of  the 
world's  finest  plays. 

Robert  Browning  was  born  in  1812  and 

D 

died  in  1889.  His  father,  though  a  clerk 
in  the  Bank  of  England,  was  a  fine  classical 
scholar  and  had  dabbled  in  verse.  His 
mother  was  an  accomplished  musician. 
Browning  had  every  early  advantage,  and 
while  still  a  lad  he  came  under  the  spell  of 
Byron  and  had  his  poetical  faculty  greatly 
stimulated  by  the  "Napoleon  of  rhyme." 
Then  came  Shelley  and  Keats,  and  their 
influence  set  him  upon  the  course  which  he 
followed  for  many  years.  His  first  poem 
was  Pauline,  which  has  passages  of  rare 
beauty  set  among  dreary  commonplaces. 
He  followed  this  with  Parace/susand  Str  af- 
ford, which  opened  to  him  the  doors  of  all 
London  salons  and  made  his  reputation. 
Sordello,  one  of  his  most  difficult  poems, 
came  next,  but  he  varied  these  dramatic 
tragedies  with  a  series  of  short  poems  called 
Bells  and  Pomegranates.  In  this  the  finest 
thing  was  Pippa  Passes,  which  was  warmly 

[109] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

praised  by  Elizabeth  Barrett,  who  after- 
wards became  his  wife.  Among  the  many 
poems  that  Browning  produced  in  five 
years  were  Colombe  s  Birthday,  A  Blot  in  the 
'Scutcheon,  Dramatic  Romances  and  Lyrics 
and  A  Soul's  Tragedy. 

Browning,  in  1846,  married  Elizabeth 
Barrett,  the  author  of  Lady  Geraldine  s 
Courtship  and  other  poems,  a  woman  who 
had  been  an  invalid,  confined  to  her  room 
for  years.  Love  gave  her  strength  to  arise 
and  walk,  and  love  also  gave  her  the  cour- 
age to  defy  the  foolish  tyranny  of  her  father 
and  elope  with  Browning.  What  kind  of 
man  that  father  was  may  be  seen  in  his 
comment  after  the  marriage:  "I've  no  ob- 
jection to  the  young  man,  but  my  daughter 
should  have  been  thinking  of  another 
world."  They  went  to  Italy,  where  for  fif- 
teen years  they  made  an  ideal  home.  Mrs. 
Browning's  story  of  her  love  is  seen  in  Son- 
nets From  the  Portuguese,  and  some  of  her 
finest  work  is  in  Casa  Guidi  Windows.  Each 
stimulated  the  other,  while  there  was  a 
notable  absence  of  that  jealousy  which  has 
often  served  to  turn  the  love  of  literary 
men  and  women  into  the  fiercest  hatred. 

Mrs.  Browning  died  suddenly  in  1861, 
and  the  poet  for  some  time  was  stunned 

[no] 


ELIZABETH  BARRETT  BROWNING 

AFTER  THE  PORTRAIT  BY 

FIELD  TALFOURD 


GREATEST  POET  SINCE  SHAKESPEARE 

by  this  unlooked-for  calamity.  He  spent 
two  years  in  seclusion  at  work  on  poems, 
but  then  he  gathered  up  his  courage  and 
once  more  took  his  old  place  in  the  social 
life  of  London.  In  Prospice  and  One  Word 
More,  written  in  the  autumn  following  his 
wife's  death,  he  shows  that  he  has  over- 
come all  doubts  of  the  reality  of  immor- 
tality. These  two  poems  alone  would 
entitle  Browning  to  the  highest  place  among 
the  world's  great  poets.  In  addition  he 
wrote  the  memorial  to  his  wife,  O  Lyric 
Lovey  that  is  the  cry  of  the  soul  left  here 
on  this  earth  to  the  soul  of  the  beloved  in 
Paradise.  To  the  sympathetic  this  poem, 
with  its  solemn  rhythm,  will  appeal  like 
splendid  organ  music. 

Among  Browning's  other  poems  that 
are  noteworthy  are  Fifine  at  the  Fair,  Red 
Cotton  Nightcap  Country,  The  Inn  Album 
and  Dramatic  Idyls.  Browning's  last  poem, 
Asolando,  appeared  in  London  on  the  same 
day  that  its  author  died  at  Venice.  As  the 
great  bell  of  San  Marco  struck  ten  in  the 
evening,  Browning,  as  he  lay  in  bed,  asked 
his  son  if  there  were  any  news  of  the  new 
volume.  A  telegram  was  read  saying  the 
book  was  well  received.  The  aged  poet 
smiled  and  breathed  his  last. 

[in] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

In  beginning  the  reading  of  Browning 
it  is  well  to  understand  that  at  least  half 
or  maybe  two-thirds  of  his  work  should  be 
discarded  at  the  outset,  as  it  is  of  interest 
only  to  scholars.  My  suggestion  to  one 
who  would  learn  to  love  Browning  is  to 

o 

get  a  little  book,  Lyrical  Poems  of  Robert 
Browning,  by  Dr.  A.  J.  George.  The  editor 
in  a  preface  indicates  the  best  work  of 
Browning,  and  also  brings  out  strongly 
the  fact  that  readers,  and  especially  young 
readers,  must  be  given  poems  which  inter- 
est them.  His  selections  of  lyrics  have  been 
made  from  this  standpoint,  and  his  notes 
will  be  found  very  helpful.  He  develops  the 
point  that  Browning's  great  revelation  to 
the  world  through  his  poems  was  his  strong 
and  abiding  assurance  that  man  has  in  him 
the  principle  of  divinity,  and  that  many  of 
the  experiences  that  the  world  calls  failures 
are  really  the  stepping  stones  of  the  ascent 
to  that  conquest  of  self  and  that  develop- 
ment of  the  whole  nature  which  means  the 
highest  life.  He  says  also  that  Browning 
is  one  of  the  most  eloquent  expounders 
of  the  doctrine  of  the  reality  of  a  future 
life,  in  which  those  who  live  a  noble  and 
unselfish  life  will  get  their  reward  in  an 
existence  free  from  all  physical  ills. 

[112] 


GREATEST  POET  SINCE  SHAKESPEARE 

In  this  little  book  will  be  found  Pippa 
Passes,  a.  noble  series  of  lyrics,  which  devel- 
ops the  idea  of  the  silent  influence  of  a 
little  silk  weaver  of  Asolo  upon  four  sets 
of  people  in  the  great  crises  of  their  lives. 
In  each  episode  Pippa  sings  a  song  that 
awakens  remorse  or  kindles  manhood  or 
arouses  patriotism  or  duty.  It  is  a  perfect 
poem.  Among  other  lyrics  given  here  are 
Evelyn  Hope,  which  must  be  bracketed  with 
Burns'  To  Mary  in  Heaven  or  with  Words- 
worth's Lucy  and  Prospice,  which  sounds 
the  note  of  deep  personal  love  that  is  as 
sure  of  immortality  as  of  life.  It  is  as 
beautiful  and  as  inspiring  as  Tennyson's 
Crossing  the  Bar.  Other  poems  due  to 
Browning's  love  for  his  wife  are  My  Star 
and  One  IVord  More. 

If  these  lyrics  appeal  to  you,  then  take 
up  some  of  Browning's  longer  poems,  A 
Blot  in  the  'Scutcheon,  Colombe  s  Birthday, 
A  SouPs  Tragedy,  Fra  Lippo  Lippi  and 
Rabbi  Ben  Ezra.  Very  few  readers  in  these 
days  have  time  or  patience  to  read  The 
Ring  and  the  Book,  but  it  will  repay  your 
attention,  as  it  is  the  most  remarkable 
attempt  in  all  literature  to  revive  the  trag- 
edy of  the  great  and  innocent  love  of  a 
woman  and  a  priest. 

["si 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

Among  the  many  fine  passages  in  Brown- 
ing, I  think  there  is  nothing  which  equals 
these  lines  in  O  Lyric  Love,  the  beautiful 
invocation  to  his  wife: 

O  lyric  Love,  half  angel  and  half  bird 
And  all  a  wonder  and  a  wild  desire- 
Boldest  of  hearts  that  ever  braved  the  sun, 
Took  sanctuary  within  the  holier  blue 
And  sang  a  kindred  soul  out  to  his  face- 
Hail  then,  and  hearken  from  the  realms  of  help ! 
Never  may  I  commence  my  song,  my  due 
To  God  who  best  taught  song  by  gift  of  thee, 
Except  with  bent  head  and  beseeching  hand- 
That  shall  despite  the  distance  and  the  dark, 
What  was,  again  may  be  ;  some  interchange 
Of  grace,  some  splendor  once  thy  very  thought, 
Some  benediction  anciently  thy  smile. 

The  songs  in  Pippa  Passes  should  be 
read,  as  they  are  as  near  perfed:  as  Shake- 
speare's songs  or  the  songs  of  Tennyson 
in  ^he  Princess, 


["4] 


MEREDITH 

AND  A  FEW  OF  His 

BEST  NOVELS 

ONE  OF  THE  GREATEST  MASTERS  OF  FIC- 
TION OF  LAST  CENTURY— "THE  ORDEAL 
OF  RICHARD  FEVEREL""DIANA  OF  THE 
CROSSWAYS"AND  OTHER  NOVELS. 

GEORGE  MEREDITH  is  acknowledged  by 
the  best  critics  to  be  among  the  great- 
est English  novelists  of  the  last  century  ^ 
yet  to  the  general  reader  he  is  only  a  name. 
Like  Henry  James,  he  is  barred  off  from 
popular  appreciation  by  a  style  which  is 
"caviare  to  the  general."  Thomas  Hardy 
is  recognized  as  the  finest  living  English 
novelist,  but  there  is  very  little  comparison 
between  himself  and  Meredith.  Professor 
William  Lyon  Phelps,  who  is  one  of  the 
best  and  sanest  of  American  critics,  says 
they  are  both  pagans,  but  Meredith  was 
an  optimist,  while  Hardy  is  a  pessimist. 
Then  he  adds  this  illuminating  comment: 
"Mr.  Hardy  is  a  great  novelist;  whereas, 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

to  adapt  a  phrase  that  Arnold  applied  to 
Emerson,  I  should  say  that  Mr.  Meredith 
was  not  a  great  novelist;  he  was  a  great 
man  who  wrote  novels." 

It  is  only  within  the  last  twenty-five 
years  that  Meredith  has  had  any  vogue  in 
this  country.  At  that  time  a  good  edition 
of  his  novels  was  issued,  and  critics  gave 
the  volumes  generous  mention  in  the  lead- 
ing magazines  and  newspapers.  But  the 
public  did  not  respond  with  any  cordiality. 
The  novel  with  us  has  come  to  be  looked 
upon  mainly  as  a  source  of  amusement, 
and  a  writer  of  fiction  who  demands  too 
keen  attention  from  his  readers  can  never 
hope  to  be  popular.  Meredith,  as  Profes- 
sor Phelps  says,  was  a  great  man  who, 
among  other  intellectual  activities,  wrote 
some  good  novels.  Doubtless  he  did  more 
real  good  to  literature  as  the  inspirer  of 
other  writers  than  he  did  with  his  books. 
For  more  than  the  ordinary  working  years 
of  most  men  he  was  one  of  the  chief  "read- 
ers" for  a  large  London  publishing  house. 
To  him  were  submitted  the  manuscripts  of 
new  novels,  and  it  was  his  privilege  to 
recognize  the  genius  of  Thomas  Hardy,  of 
the  author  of  'The  Story  of  an  African  Farm 
and  other  now  famous  English  novelists. 

[116] 


MEREDITH  AND  His  BEST  NOVELS 

Meredith  was  a  singularly  acute  critic  of 
the  work  of  others,  but  when  he  came  to 
write  himself  he  cast  his  thoughts  in  a  style 
that  has  been  the  despair  of  many  admir- 
ers. In  this  he  resembled  Browning,  who 
never  would  write  verse  that  was  easy  read- 
ing. Meredith's  thought  is  usually  clear, 
yet  his  brilliant  but  erratic  mind  was  im- 
pelled to  clothe  this  thought  in  the  most 
bizarre  garments.  Literary  paradox  he 
loved;  his  mind  turned  naturally  to  meta- 
phor, and  despite  the  protests  of  his  closest 
friends  he  continued  to  puzzle  and  exas- 
perate the  public.  He  who  could  have 
written  the  greatest  novels  of  his  age  merely 
wrote  stories  which  serve  to  illustrate  his 
theories  of  life  and  conduct.  No  man  ever 
put  more  real  thought  into  novels  than  he; 
none  had  a  finer  eye  for  the  beauties  of 
nature  or  the  development  of  character. 
But  he  had  no  patience  to  develop  his 
men  and  women  in  the  clear,  orthodox  way. 
He  imagined  that  the  ordinary  reader 
could  follow  his  lightning  flashes  of  illu- 
mination, his  piling  up  of  metaphor  on 
metaphor,  and  the  result  is  that  many 
are  discouraged  by  his  methods,  just  as 
nine  readers  out  often  are  wearied  when 
they  attempt  to  read  Browning's  longer 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

poems.  His  kinship  to  Browning  is  strong 
in  style  and  in  method  of  thought,  in  his 
way  of  leaping  from  one  conclusion  to 
another,  in  his  elimination  of  all  the  usual 
small  connecting  words  and  in  his  liberties 
with  the  language.  He  seemed  to  be  writ- 
ing for  himself,  not  for  the  general  public, 
and  he  never  took  into  account  the  slower 
mental  processes  of  those  not  endowed 
with  his  own  vivid  imagination. 

Meredith's  life  was  that  of  a  scholar;  it 
contained  few  exciting  episodes.  He  was 
of  Welsh  and  Irish  stock.  At  an  early  age 
he  was  sent  to  Germany,  where  he  remained 
at  a  Moravian  school  until  he  was  fifteen. 
He  then  returned  to  England  to  study 
law,  but  he  never  practiced  it.  For  a  num- 
ber of  years  he  was  a  regular  contributor 
to  the  London  MORNING  POST,  and  in 
1866  he  acted  as  correspondent  during  the 
Austro-Italian  war.  For  many  years  he 
served  as  chief  reader  and  literary  adviser 
to  Chapman  &  Hall,  the  English  pub- 
lishers, and  in  that  capacity  he  showed  an 
insight  that  led  to  the  development  of 
many  authors  whose  first  work  was  crude 
and  unpromising.  Meredith  himself  began 
his  literary  career  with  T'he  Shaving  ofShag- 

)  a  series  of  Oriental  tales  the  central 

[118] 


GEORGE  MEREDITH  WITH  His  DAUGHTER  AND 

GRANDCHILDREN— FROM  A  PHOTOGRAPH 

TAKEN  SHORTLY  BEFORE  His 

DEATH 


MEREDITH  AND  His  BEST  NOVELS 

idea  of  which  is  the  overcoming  of  estab- 
lished evil.  Shagpat  stands  for  any  evil  or 
superstition,  and  Shibli  Bagarag,  the  hero, 
is  the  reformer.  This  book,  with  its  wealth 
of  metaphor,  opened  the  door  for  Mere- 
dith, but  he  did  not  score  a  success  until 
he  wrote  The  Ordeal  of  Richard  Fever  el, 
two  years  later.  Despite  its  faults,  this  is 
his  greatest  book,  and  it  is  the  one  which 
readers  should  begin  with.  It  is  overloaded 
with  aphorism  in  the  famous  "Pilgrim's 
Scrip,"which  is  a  diary  kept  by  Sir  Austin, 
the  father  of  Richard.  The  boy  is  trained 
to  cut  women  out  of  his  life,  and  just  when 
the  father's  theory  seems  to  have  succeeded 
Richard  meets  and  falls  in  love  with  Lucy, 
and  the  whole  towering  structure  founded 
on  the  "Pilgrim's  Scrip" falls  into  ruin.  The 
scene  in  which  Richard  and  Lucy  meet  is 
one  of  the  great  scenes  in  English  fiction, 
in  which  Meredith's  passionate  love  of 
nature  serves  to  bring  out  the  natural  love 
of  the  two  young  people.  Earth  was  all 
greenness  in  the  eyes  of  these  two  lovers, 
and  nature  served  only  to  deepen  the  love 
that  they  saw  in  each  other's  gaze  and  felt 
with  thrilling  force  in  each  other's  kisses. 
But  even  stronger  that  this  scene  is  that 
last  terrible  chapter,  in  which  Richard 

["9] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

returns  to  his  home  and  refuses  to  stay 
withLucy  and  her  child.  Stevenson  declared 
that  this  parting  scene  was  the  strongest 
bit  of  English  since  Shakespeare.  It  cer- 
tainly reaches  great  heights  of  exaltation, 
and  in  its  simplicity  it  reveals  what  miracles 
Meredith  could  work  when  he  allowed  his 
creative  imagination  full  play. 

Another  story  which  is  usually  bracketed 
with  this  is  Diana  of  the  Crossways.  This 
great  novel  was  founded  on  a  real  incident 
in  English  history  of  Meredith's  time. 
Diana  Warwick  was  drawn  from  Caroline 
Norton,  one  of  the  three  beautiful  and  bril- 
liant granddaughters  of  Sheridan,  author 
of  tfhe  School  for  Scandal.  Her  marriage 
was  disastrous,  and  her  husband  accused 
her  of  infidelity  with  Lord  Melbourne, 
Prime  Minister  at  the  time.  His  divorce 
suit  caused  a  great  scandal,  but  it  resulted 
in  her  vindication.  Then  later  she  was 
accused  of  betraying  to  a  writer  on  the 
TIMES  the  secret  that  Sir  Robert  Peel  had 
decided  to  repeal  the  corn  laws.  This  secret 
had  been  confided  to  her  by  Sidney  Her- 
bert,one  of  heradmirers.  Meredith's  novel, 
in  which  the  results  of  Diana's  treachery 
were  brought  out,  resulted  in  a  public 
inquiry  into  the  charge  against  Caroline 

[120] 


• 
*  i  c.  J     .          •  •  --..;. 

Fi  INT  COTTAGE,  BOXHILL,  THE  HOME  OF  GEORGE 

MEREDITH-HIS  WRITING  WAS  DONE  IN 

A  SMALL  Swiss  CHALET  IN 

THE  GARDEN 


MEREDITH  AND  His  BEST  NOVELS 

Norton,  which  found  that  she  was  inno- 
cent. But  the  fact  that  Meredith  used  such 
an  incident  as  the  climax  of  his  story  gave 
Diana  of  the  Crossways  an  enormous  vogue, 
and  did  much  to  bring  the  novelist  into 
public  favor. 

No  more  brilliant  woman  than  Diana 
has  ever  been  drawn  by  Meredith,  but 
despite  the  art  of  her  creator  it  is  impos- 
sible for  the  reader  to  imagine  her  selling 
for  money  a  great  party  secret  which  had 
been  whispered  to  her  by  the  man  she 
loved.  She  was  too  keen  a  woman  to  plead, 
as  Diana  pleaded,  that  she  did  notrecognize 
the  importance  of  this  secret,  for  the  de- 
fense is  cut  away  by  her  admission  that  she 
was  promised  thousands  of  pounds  by  the 
newspaperman  at  the  very  time  that  her 
extravagances  had  loaded  her  with  debts. 

Space  is  lacking  here  to  do  more  than 
mention  three  or  four  of  Meredith's  other 
novels  that  are  fine  works  of  art.  These 
are  Rhoda  Fleming^  Sandra  Belloni,  Evan 
Harrington  and  The  Egoist.  Each  is  a  mas- 
terpiece in  its  way;  each  is  full  of  human 
passion,  yet  tinged  with  a  philosophy  that 
lifts  up  the  novels  to  what  Meredith  him- 
self called  "honorable  fiction,  a  fount  of 
life,  an  aid  to  life,  quick  with  our  blood." 

[12.] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

The  novel  to  him  was  a  means  of  showing 
man's  spiritual  nature,"a  soul  born  active, 
wind-beaten,  but  ascending." 

A  score  of  novels  Meredith  wrote  in  his 
long  life.  The  work  of  his  later  years  was 
not  happy.  'The  Amazing  Marriage  and 
Lord  Ormont  and  His  Aminta  are  mere 
shadows  of  his  earlier  work,  with  all  his 
old  mannerisms  intensified.  But  if  you  like 
Richard  and  Diana,  then  you  can  enlarge 
your  acquaintance  with  Meredith  to  your 
own  exceeding  profit,  for  he  is  one  of  the 
great  masters  of  fiftion,  who  used  the  novel 
merely  to  preach  his  doctrine  of  the  rich- 
ness and  fulness  of  human  life  if  we  would 
but  see  it  with  his  eyes. 


[122] 


STEVENSON 

PRINCE  OF  MODERN 

STORY-TELLERS 

His  STORIES  OF  ADVENTURE  AND  His 
BRILLIANT  ESSAYS-"TREASURE  ISLAND" 
AND  "DR.  JEKYLL  AND  MR.  HYDE"  His 
MOST  POPULAR  BOOKS. 

IT  is  as  difficult  to  criticise  the  work  of 
Robert  Louis  Stevenson  as  it  is  to  find 
faults  in  the  friend  that  you  love  as  a 
brother.  For  with  all  his  faults,  this  young 
Scotchman  with  his  appealing  charm  dis- 
arms criticism.  Nowhere  in  all  literature 
may  one  find  his  like  for  warming  the  heart 
unless  it  be  Charles  Lamb,  of  gracious 
memory,  and  the  secret  of  this  charm  is 
that  Stevenson  remained  a  child  to  the  end 
of  his  days,  with  all  a  child's  eagerness  for 
love  and  praise,  and  with  all  a  child's  pas- 
sion for  making  believe  that  his  puppets 
are  real  flesh  and  blood  people.  When 
such  a  nature  is  endowed  with  consummate 
skill  in  the  use  of  words,  then  one  gets  the 
finest,  if  not  the  greatest,  of  creative  artists. 

[I23] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

In  sheer  technical  skill  Stevenson  stands 
head  and  shoulders  above  all  the  other 
literary  craftsmen  of  his  day;  but  this  skill 
was  not  used  to  refine  his  meaning  until 

o 

it  wearied  the  reader,  as  in  the  case  of  Henry 
James,  nor  was  it  used  to  bewilder  him 
with  the  richness  of  his  resources,  as  was 
too  often  the  case  with  George  Meredith. 
With  Stevenson,  style  had  actually  become 
the  man;  he  could  not  write  the  simplest 
article  in  any  other  than  a  highly  finished 
literary  way.  Witness  the  amazingly  elo- 
quent defense  of  Father  Damien  which  he 
dashed  off  in  a  few  hours  and  read  to  his 
wife  and  his  stepson  before  the  ink  was  dry 
on  the  sheets. 

Above  all  other  things  Stevenson  was  a 
great  natural  story-teller.  With  him  the 
story  was  the  main  consideration,  yet  in 
some  of  his  short  tales  such  as  Markheim, 
or  A  Lodging  for  the  Night.,  or  The  Sire  de 
Maletroif  s  Door.,  the  story  itself  merely 
serves  as  a  thread  upon  which  he  has  strung 
the  most  remarkable  analysis  of  a  man's 
soul.  He  has  the  distinction  of  having 
written  in  Treasure  Island  t^he  best  piratical 
story  of  the  last  century.  If  he  could  have 
maintained  the  high  level  of  the  opening 
chapter  he  would  have  produced  a  work 

[124] 


PRINCE  OF  MODERN  STORY-TELLERS 

worthy  to  rank  with  Robinson  Crusoe.  As 
it  is,  he  created  two  villains,  the  blind  man 
Pew  and  John  Silver,  who  are  absolutely 
unique  in  literature.  The  blind  pirate  in 
his  malevolent  fury  is  a  creature  that  chills 
the  heart,  while  Silver  is  a  cheerful  villain 
who  murders  with  a  smile.  In  Dr.  Jekyll 
and  Mr.  Hyde  Stevenson  has  aroused  that 
sense  of  mystery  and  horror  which  springs 
from  the  spectacle  of  the  domination  of  an 
evil  spirit  over  a  nature  essentially  kind 
and  good. 

Stevenson  came  of  a  race  of  Scotch  men 
of  affairs.  His  grandfather  was  the  most 
distinguished  lighthouse  builder  of  his  day 

O  D  f  J 

and  his  father  gained  prominence  in  the 
same  work  that  demands  the  highest  engi- 
neering skill  with  great  executive  capacity. 
Stevenson  himself  would  have  been  an 
explorer  or  a  soldier  of  fortune  had  he  been 
born  with  the  physical  strength  to  fit  his 
mental  endowments.  His  childhood  was  so 
full  of  sickness  that  it  reads  like  a  hospital 
report.  His  life  was  probably  preserved 
by  the  assiduous  care  and  rare  devotion  of 
an  old  Scotch  nurse,  Alison  Cunningham, 
whom  he  has  immortalized  in  his  letters 
and  in  his  A  Child's  Garden  of  Verse.  The 
sickly  boy  was  an  eager  reader  of  every- 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

thing  that  fell  in  his  way  in  romance  and 
poetry.  Later  he  devoted  himself  to  sys- 
tematic training  of  his  powers  of  observation 
and  his  great  capacity  for  expressing  his 
thoughts. 

His  youth  was  spent  in  migrations  to 
the  south  in  winter  and  in  efforts  to  thrive 
in  Scotland's  dour  climate  in  the  summer. 
His  school  training  was  fitful  and  brief, 
but  from  the  age  of  ten  the  boy  had  been 
training  himself  in  the  field  which  he  felt 
was  to  be  his  own.  His  first  literary  work 
was  essays  and  descriptive  sketches  for  the 
magazines.  Then  came  short  stories  in 
which  he  revealed  great  capacity.  Recog- 
nition came  very  slowly.  He  was  compara- 
tively unknown  after  he  had  produced  such 
charming  work  as  An  Inland  Voyage  and 
'Travels  With  a  Donkey,  not  to  mention  the 
New  Arabian  Nights.  Popularity  came 
with  Treasure  Island,  written  as  a  story  for 
boys,  and  the  one  work  of  Stevenson's  in 
which  his  creative  imagination  does  not 
flag  toward  the  end;  but  fame  came  only 
«fter  the  writing  of  The  Strange  Case  of  Dr. 
Jekyll  and  Mr.  Hyde— the  most  remarkable 
story  of  a  dual  personality  produced  in  the 
last  century.  After  this  he  wrote  a  long 
succession  of  stories,  not  one  of  which  can 

[126] 


w 

x 
3   •< 


5    ? 


S    > 

O    f 
Z 


PRINCE  OF  MODERN  STORY-TELLERS 

be  called  a  masterpiece  because  of  the 
author's  inability  to  finish  his  novels  as  he 
planned  them.  Lack  of  patience  or  want 
of  sustained  creative  power  invariably  made 
him  cut  short  his  novels  or  end  them  in  a 
way  that  exasperates  the  reader. 

Some  months  Stevenson  spentin  Califor- 
nia, but  this  State, with  its  romantic  history 
and  its  singular  scenic  beauty,  appeared  to 
have  little  influence  on  his  genius.  In  facl, 
locality  seemed  not  to  color  the  work  of 
his  imagination.  His  closing  years  were 
spent  in  Somoa,  a  South  Sea  Island  para- 
dise, in  which  he  reveled  in  the  primitive 
conditions  of  life  and  recovered  much  of 
his  early  zest  in  physical  life.  Yet  his  best 
work  in  those  last  years  dealt  not  with  the 
palm-fringed  atolls  of  the  Pacific,  but  with 
the  bleak  Scotch  moors  which  refused  him 
a  home.  In  his  letters  he  dwells  on  the 
curious  obsession  of  his  imagination  by 
old  Scotch  scenes  and  characters,  and  on 
the  day  of  his  death  he  dictated  a  chapter 
of  Weir  of  Hermiston,  a  romance  of  the 
picturesque  period  of  Scotland  which  had 
in  it  the  elements  of  his  best  work. 

It  is  idle  to  deny  that  Stevenson  appeals 
only  to  a  limited  audience.  Despite  his 
keen  interest  in  all  kinds  of  people,  he 

[127] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

lacked  that  sympathetic  touch  which  brings 
large  sales  and  wide  circulation.  About  the 
time  of  his  death  his  admirers  declared  he 
would  supersede  Scott  or  Dickens;  but  the 
seventeen  years  since  his  death  have  seen 
many  changes  in  literary  reputations.  Ste- 
venson has  held  his  own  remarkably  well. 
As  a  man  the  interest  in  him  is  still  keen, 
but  of  his  works  only  a  few  are  widely 
read. 

Among  these  the  first  place  must  be  given 
to  Dr.  Jekyll  and  Mr.  Hyde,  partly  because 
of  the  profound  impression  made  upon  the 
public  mind  by  the  dramatization  of  this 
tale,  and  partly  because  it  appeals  strongly 
to  the  sense  of  the  mystery  of  conflicting 
personality.  Next  to  this  is  'Treasure  Island, 
one  of  the  best  romances  of  adventure  ever 
written.  Readers  who  cannot  feel  a  thrill 
of  genuine  terror  when  the  blind  pirate 
Pew  comes  tapping  with  his  cane  have 
missed  a  great  pleasure.  One-legged  John 
Silver,  in  his  cheerful  lack  of  all  the  ordi- 
nary virtues,  is  a  character  that  puts  the 
fear  of  death  upon  the  reader.  The  open- 
ing chapter  of  this  story  is  one  of  thefinest 
things  in  all  the  literature  of  adventure. 

Of  Stevenson's  other  work  the  two 
Scotch  stories,  Kidnaped  and  David Balf our, 

[128] 


O    S 


<  o    2 

nf 


PRINCE  OF  MODERN  STORY-TELLERS 

always  seemed  to  me  to  be  among  his  best. 
The  chapter  on  the  flight  of  David  and 
Allan  across  the  moor,  the  contest  in  play- 
ing the  pipes  and  the  adventures  of  David 
and  Catriona  in  Holland— these  are  things 
to  read  many  times  and  enjoy  the  more  at 
every  reading.  Stevenson,  like  Jack  Lon- 
don, is  a  writer  for  men;  he  could  not  draw 
women  well.  When  he  brings  one  in  there 

O 

is  usually  an  end  of  stirring  adventure, 
just  as  London  spoiled  Tike  Sea  Wo/f*whh 
his  literary  heroine. 

Of  Stevenson's  short  stories  the  finest 
are  The  Pavilion  on  the  Links,  a  tale  of  Sici- 
lian vengeance  and  English  love  that  is  full 
of  haunting  mystery  and  the  deadly  fear 
of  unknown  assassins;  Markheim,  a  brilliant 
example  of  this  author's  skill  in  laying  bare 
the  conflict  of  a  soul  with  evil  and  its  ulti- 
mate triumph;  'The  Sire  de  Maletroit's  Door^ 
a  vivid  picture  of  the  cruelty  and  the  auto- 
cratic power  of  a  great  French  noble  of  the 
fifteenth  century,  and  A  Lodging  for  the 
Nighty  a  remarkable  defense  of  his  life  by 
the  vagabond  poet,  Villon.  Other  short 
stories  by  Stevenson  are  worth  careful 
study,  but  if  you  like  these  I  have  men- 
tioned you  will  need  no  guide  to  those 
which  strike  your  fancy. 

[129] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

The  vogue  of  Stevenson's  essays  will 
last  as  long  as  that  of  his  romances;  for  he 
excelled  in  this  literary  art  of  putting  his 
personality  into  familiar  talks  with  his 
reader.  He  ranks  with  Lamb  and  Thack- 
eray, Washington  Irving  and  Donald  G. 
Mitchell.  Read  those  fine  short  sermons, 
Puhis  et  Umbra,  and  Aes  Trip/ex,  the  latter 
with  its  eloquent  picture  of  sudden  death 
in  the  fulness  of  power  which  was  realized 
in  Stevenson's  own  fate.  Read  Books  Which 
Have  Influenced  Me,  A  Gossip  on  Romance 
and  'Talk  and  ^Talkers.  They  are  unsur- 
passed for  thought  and  feeling  and  for 
brilliancy  of  style. 

But  above  everything  looms  the  man 
himself— a  chronic  invalid,  who  might  well 
have  pleaded  his  weakness  and  constant 
pains  as  an  excuse  for  idleness  and  railings 
against  fate.  Stoic  courage  in  the  strong  is 
a  virtue,  but  how  much  greater  the  cheerful 
courage  that  laughs  at  sickness  and  pain! 
Stevenson  writing  in  a  sickbed  stories  and 
essays  that  help  one  to  endure  the  blows 
of  fate  is  a  spectacle  such  as  this  world  has 
few  to  offer.  So  the  man's  life  and  work 
have  come  to  be  a  constant  inspiration  to 
those  who  are  faint-hearted,  a  call  to  arms 
of  all  one's  courage  and  devotion. 


THOMAS  HARDY 
AND  His  TRAGIC  TALES 

OF  WESSEX 

GREATEST  LIVING  WRITER  OF  ENGLISH 
FICTION— BECAUSE  OF  RESENTMENT  OF 
HARSH  CRITICISMS  THE  PROSE  MASTER 
TURNS  TO  VERSE. 

No  one  will  question  the  assertion  that 
Thomas  Hardy  is  the  greatest  living 
English  writer  of  fiction,  and  the  pity  of  it  is 
that  a  man  with  so  splendid  an  equipment 
for  writing  novels  of  the  first  rank  should 
have  failed  for  many  years  to  give  the  world 
any  work  in  the  special  field  in  which  he 
is  an  acknowledged  master.  Hardy  seems 
to  have  revolted  from  certain  harsh  criti- 
cism of  his  last  novel,  Jude  the  Obscure, 
and  to  have  determined  that  he  would 
write  no  more  fiction  for  an  unappreciative 
world.  So  he  has  turned  to  the  writing  of 

O 

verse,  in  which  he  barely  takes  second 
rank.  It  is  one  of  the  tragedies  of  literature 
to  think  of  a  man  of  Hardy's  rank  as  a 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

novelist,  who  might  give  the  world  a  sec- 
ond Tess  or  The  Return  of  the  Native, 
contenting  himself  with  a  ponderous  poem 
like  The  Dynasts,  or  wasting  his  powers  on 
minor  poems  containing  no  real  poetry. 

Hardy's  best  novels  are  among  the  few 
in  English  fiction  that  can  be  read  again 
and  again,  and  that  reveal  at  every  reading 
some  fresh  beauties  of  thought  or  style. 
The  man  is  so  big,  so  genuine  and  so  un- 
like all  other  writers  that  his  work  must 
be  set  apart  in  a  class  by  itself.  Were  he 
not  so  richly  endowed  his  pessimism  would 
be  fatal,  for  the  world  does  not  favor  the 
novelist  who  demands  that  his  fiction 
should  be  governed  by  the  same  hard  rules 
that  govern  real  life.  In  the  work  of  most 
novelists  we  know  that  whatever  harsh  fate 
may  befall  the  leading  characters  the  skies 
will  be  sunny  before  the  story  closes,  and 
the  worthy  souls  who  have  battled  against 
malign  destiny  will  receive  their  reward. 
Not  so  with  Hardy.  We  know  when  we 
begin  one  of  his  tales  that  tragedy  is  in 
store  for  his  people.  The  dark  cloud  of 
destiny  soon  obscures  the  heavens,  and 
through  the  lowering  storm  the  victims 
move  on  to  the  final  scene  in  which  the 
wreck  of  their  fortunes  is  completed. 


THOMAS  HARDY— A  PORTRAIT  WHICH  BRINGS  OUT 

STRIKINGLY  THE  MAN  OF  CREATIVE  POWER, 

THE  ARTIST,  THE  PHILOSOPHER 

AND  THE  POET 


HARDY  AND  His  WESSEX  TALES 

Literary  genius  can  work  no  greater 
miracle  than  this— to  make  the  reader  accept 
as  a  transcript  of  life  stories  in  which  gen- 
erous, unselfish  people  are  dealt  heavy 
blows  by  fate,  while  the  mean-souled,  sor- 
did men  and  women  often  escape  their  just 
deserts.  Hardy  is  not  unreligious;  he  is 
simply  and  frankly  pagan.  Yet  he  differs 
from  the  classical  writers  in  the  fact  that 
he  is  keenly  alive  to  all  the  strong  influ- 
ences of  nature  on  a  sympathetic  mind, 
and  he  is  also  a  believer  in  the  power  of 
romantic  love. 

No  one  has  ever  equaled  Hardy  in  mak- 
ing the  reader  feel  the  living  power  of  trees 
and  other  objects  of  nature.  You  can  not 
escape  the  influence  of  his  scenic  effects. 
These  are  never  theatrical— in  fact  they 
seem  to  form  a  vital  part  of  every  story. 
The  scenes  of  all  his  novels  are  laid  in  his 
native  Dorsetshire,  which  he  has  thinly 
disguised  under  the  old  Saxon  name  of 
Wessex.  In  Far  From  the  Madding  Crowd 
Hardy  first  demonstrated  the  tremendous 
possibilities  of  rural  scenes  as  a  vital  back- 
ground for  a  story,  but  in  I'he  Return  of  the 
Native  he  actually  makes  Egdon  heath  the 
most  absorbing  feature  of  the  book.  All  the 
characters  seem  to  take  life  and  coloring: 

o 

[J33] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

from  this  heath,  which  has  in  it  the  potency 
of  transforming  characters  and  of  wrecking 
lives.  And  in  T'ess  the  peaceful,  rural  scenes 
appear  to  accentuate  the  tragedy  of  the 
heroine's  unavailing  struggles  against  a 
fate  that  was  worse  than  death. 

Hardy's  parents  intended  him  for  the 
church,  but  the  boy  probably  gave  some 
indications  of  his  pagan  cast  of  mind,  for 
they  finally  compromised  by  apprenticing 
him  to  an  ecclesiastical  architect.  In  this 
calling  the  youth  worked  with  sympathy 
and  ability;  the  results  of  this  training  may 
be  seen  in  the  perfection  of  his  plots  and 
in  his  fondness  for  graphic  description  of 
churches  and  other  picturesque  buildings. 
One  curious  feature  of  this  training  may 
be  seen  in  Hardy's  sympathy  and  rever- 
ence for  any  church  building.  As  Professor 
William  Lyon  Phelps  very  aptly  says  of 
Hardy:  "No  man  to-day  has  less  respect 
for  God  and  more  devotion  to  his  house." 

The  antipathy  of  Hardy  to  any  kind  of 
publicity  has  kept  the  facts  of  his  life  in 
the  background,  but  it  is  an  open  secret 
that  much  of  the  longing  of  Jude  for  a  col- 
lege education  was  drawn  from  his  own 
boyhood.  It  is  also  a  matter  of  record 
that  as  a  boy  he  served  as  amanuensis  for 

['34] 


HARDY  AND  His  WESSEX  TALES 

many  servant  maids,  writing  the  love  let- 
ters which  they  dictated.  In  this  way, 
before  he  knew  the  real  meaning  of  sex  and 
the  significance  of  life  he  had  obtained  a 
deep  insight  into  the  nature  of  women, 
which  served  him  in  good  stead  when  he 
came  to  draw  his  heroines.  All  his  women 
are  made  up  of  mingled  tenderness  and 
caprice,  and  though  female  critics  of  his 
work  may  claim  that  these  traits  are  over- 
drawn, no  man  ever  feels  like  dissecting 
Hardy's  women,  for  the  reason  that  they 
are  so  charmingly  feminine. 

One  may  fancy  that  Hardy  took  great 
delight  in  his  architectural  work,  for  it 
required  many  excursions  to  old  churches 
in  Dorsetshire  to  see  whether  they  were 
worth  restoring.  When  he  was  thirty-one 
Hardy  decided  to  abandon  architecture  for 
fiction.  His  first  novel,  Desperate  Remedies, 
was  crude,  but  it  is  interesting  as  showing 
the  novelist  in  his  first  attempts  to  reveal 
real  life  and  character.  His  second  book, 
Under  the  Greenwood  T'ree,  is  a  charming 
love  story,  and  A  Pair  of  Blue  Eyes  was  a 
forerunner  of  his  first  great  story,  Far  From 
the  Madding  Crowd.  It  may  have  been  the 
title,  torn  from  a  line  of  Gray's  Elegy,  or 
the  novelty  of  the  tale,  in  which  English 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

rustics  were  depicted  as  ably  as  in  George 
Eliot's  novels,  that  made  it  appeal  to  the 
great  public.  Whatever  the  cause,  the  book 
made  a  great  popular  hit.  I  can  recall  when 
Henry  Holt  brought  it  out  in  the  pretty 
Leisure  Hour  series  in  1875.  Three  years 
later  Hardy  produced  his  finest  work,  The 
Return  of  the  Native.  He  followed  this 
with  more  than  a  dozen  novels,  among 
which  may  be  mentioned  The  Mayor  of 
Caster  bridge  t  The  Woodlanders,  Tess  of  the 
d'Urbervilles,  and  Jude  the  Obscure. 

In  taking  up  Hardy  one  should  begin 
with  Far  From  the  Madding  Crowd.  The 
story  of  Bathsheba  Everdene's  relations 
with  her  three  lovers,  Sergeant  Troy,  Bold- 
wood  and  Gabriel  Oak,  moves  one  at  times 
to  some  impatience  with  this  charming 
woman's  frequent  change  of  mind,  but  she 
would  not  be  so  attractive  or  so  natural  if 
she  were  not  so  full  of  caprice.  His  women 
all  have  strong  human  passion,  but  they 
are  destitute  of  religious  faith.  They  adore 
with  rare  fervor  the  men  whom  they  love. 
In  this  respect  Bathsheba  is  like  Eustacia, 
Tess,  Marty  South  or  Lady  Constantine. 
Social  rank,  education  or  breeding  does  not 
change  them.  Evidently  Hardy  believes 
women  are  made  to  charm  and  comfort 

[136] 


HARDY  AND  His  WESSEX  TALES 

man,  not  to  lead  him  to  spiritual  heights, 
where  the  air  is  thin  and  chill  and  kisses 
have  no  sweetness. 

In  his  first  novel  Hardy  lightened  the 
tragedy  of  life  with  rare  comedy.  These 
comic  interludes  are  furnished  by  a  choice 
collection  of  rustics,  who  discuss  the  affairs 
of  the  universe  and  of  their  own  township 
with  a  humor  that  is  infectious.  In  this 
work  Hardy  surpasses  George  Eliot  and 
all  other  novelists  of  his  day,  just  as  he 
surpasses  them  all  in  such  wholesome  types 
of  country  life  as  Giles  Winterbourne  and 
Marty  South  of  ¥he  Woodlanders.  No 
pathos  is  finer  than  Marty's  unselfish  love 
for  the  man  who  cannot  see  her  own  rare 
spirit,  and  nothing  that  Hardy  has  written 
is  more  powerful  than  Marty's  lament 
over  the  grave  of  Giles: 

"Now,  my  own,  my  love, "she  whispered, "you  are 
mine,  and  on'y  mine,  for  she  has  forgot  'ee  at  last, 
although  for  her  you  died.  But  I— whenever  I  get  up 
I'll  think  of 'ee,  and  whenever  I  lie  down  I'll  think  of 
'ee.  Whenever  I  plant  the  young  larches  I'll  think 
none  can  plant  as  you  planted;  and  whenever  I  split  a 
gad,  and  whenever  I  turn  the  cider-wring,  I'll  say  none 
could  do  it  like  you.  If  I  forget  your  name,  let  me  for- 
get home  and  heaven!  But,  no,  no,  my  love,  I  never 
can  forget  'ee,  for  you  was  a  good  man  and  did  good 
things ! ' ' 

['37] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

The  Return  of  the  Native  is  generally 
regarded  as  Hardy's  finest  work.  Certainly 
in  this  novel  of  passion  and  despair  he  has 
conjured  up  elements  that  speak  to  the 
heart  of  every  reader.  The  hand  of  fate 
clutches  hold  of  all  the  characters.  When 
Eustacia  fails  to  go  to  the  door  and  admit 
her  husband's  mother  she  sets  in  motion 
events  that  bring  swift  ruin  upon  her  as 
well  as  upon  others.  At  every  turn  of  the 
story  the  somber  Egdon  heath  looms  in 
the  background,  more  real  than  any  char- 
acter in  the  romance,  a  sinister  force  that 
seems  to  sweep  the  characters  on  to  their 
doom,  Tm  is  more  appealing  than  any 
other  of  Mr.  Hardy's  works,  but  it  is  hurt 
by  his  desire  to  prove  that  the  heroine  was 
a  good  woman  in  spite  of  her  sins  against 
the  social  code.  What  has  also  given  this 
work  a  great  vogue  is  the  splendid  acting 
of  Mrs.  Fiske  in  the  play  made  from  the 
novel. 

In  Jude  the  Obscure  Hardy  had  a  splen- 
did conception,  but  he  developed  It  in  a 
morbid  way,  bringing  out  the  animalism  of 
the  hero's  wife  and  forcing  upon  the  reader 
his  curious  ideas  about  marriage. 

But  above  and  beyond  everything  else 
Thomas  Hardy  is  one  of  the  greatest 

[-38] 


HARDY  AND  His  WESSEX  TALES 

story  tellers  the  world  has  ever  seen.  You 
may  take  up  any  of  his  works  and  after 
reading  a  chapter  you  have  a  keen  desire 
to  follow  the  tale  to  the  end,  despite  the 
fad:  that  you  feel  sure  the  end  will  be 
tragic.  Nothing  is  forced  for  effect;  the 
whole  story  moves  with  the  simplicity  of 
fate  itself,  and  the  characters,  good  and  bad, 
are  swept  on  to  their  doom  as  though  they 
were  caught  in  the  rush  of  waters  that  go 
over  Niagara  falls.  Hardy's  style  is  clear, 
simple,  direct,  and  abounds  in  Biblical  allu- 
sions and  phrases.  In  nature  study  Hardy's 
novels  are  a  liberal  education,  for  beyond 
any  other  author  of  the  last  century  he  has 
brought  out  the  beauty  and  the  significance 
of  tree  and  flower,  heath  and  mountain. 
They  may  be  read  many  times,  and  at  each 
perusal  new  beauties  will  be  discovered  to 
reward  the  reader. 


KIPLING'S 

BEST  SHORT  STORIES 
AND  POEMS 

TALES  OF  EAST  INDIAN  LIFE  AND  CHAR- 
ACTER—IDEAL TRAINING  OF  THE  GENIUS 
THATHASPRODUCED  SOME  OFTHEBEST 
LITERARY  WORK  OF  OUR  DAY. 

RUDYARD  KIPLING  cannot  be  classified 
with  any  writer  of  his  own  age  or  of 
any  literary  age  in  the  past.  His  tremen- 
dous strength,  his  visual  faculty,  even  his 
mannerisms,  are  his  own.  He  has  written 
too  much  for  his  own  fame,  but  although 
the  next  century  will  discard  nine-tenths 
of  his  work,  it  will  hold  fast  to  the  other 
tenth  as  among  the  best  short  stories  and 
poems  that  our  age  produced.  Kipling  is 
essentially  a  short-story  writer;  not  one  of 
his  longer  novels  has  any  real  plot  or  the 
power  to  hold  the  reader's  interest  to  the 
end.  Kim,  the  best  of  his  long  works,  is 
merely  a  series  of  panoramic  views  of  Indian 
life  and  character,  which  could  be  split  up 
into  a  dozen  short  stories  and  sketches. 

[140] 


KIPLING'S  BEST  STORIES  AND  POEMS 

But  in  the  domain  of  the  short  story 
Kipling  is  easily  the  first  great  creative 
artist  of  his  time.  No  one  approaches  him 
in  vivid  descriptive  power,  in  keen  char- 
acter portraiture,  in  the  faculty  of  making 
a  strange  and  alien  life  as  real  to  us  as 
the  life  we  have  always  known.  And  in 
some  of  his  more  recent  work,  as  in  the 
story  of  the  two  young  Romans  in  Puck 
of  Pook's  Hi//,  Kipling  reaches  rare  heights 
in  reproducing  the  romance  of  a  bygone 
age.  In  these  tales  of  ancient  Britain  the 
poet  in  Kipling  has  full  sway  and  his  visual 
power  moves  with  a  freedom  that  stamps 
clearly  and  deeply  every  image  upon  the 
reader's  mind. 

The  first  ten  years  of  Kipling's  literary 
activity  were  given  over  to  a  wonderful 
reproduction  of  East  Indian  life  as  seen 
through  sympathetic  English  eyes.  Yet 
the  sympathy  that  is  revealed  in  Kipling's 
best  sketches  of  native  life  in  India  is 
never  tinged  with  sentiment.  The  native 
is  always  drawn  in  his  relations  to  the 
Englishman;  always  the  traits  of  revenge 
or  of  gratitude  or  of  dog-like  devotion 
are  brought  out.  Kipling  knows  the  East 
Indian  through  and  through,  because  in 
his  childhood  he  had  a  rare  opportunity  to 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

watch  the  native.  The  barrier  of  reserve, 
which  was  always  maintained  against  the 
native  Englishman,  was  let  down  in  the 
case  of  this  precocious  child,  who  was  a  far 
keener  observer  than  most  adults.  And 
these  early  impressions  lend  an  extraordi- 
nary life  and  vitality  to  the  sketches  and 
stories  on  which  Kipling's  fame  will  ulti- 
mately rest. 

The  early  years  of  Kipling  were  spent  in 
an  ideal  way  for  the  development  of  the 
creative  literary  artist.  Born  at  Bombay 
in  December,  1865,  he  absorbed  Hindu- 
stanee  from  his  native  nurse,  and  he  saw 
the  native  as  he  really  is,  without  the  guard 
which  is  habitually  put  up  in  the  presence 
of  the  Briton,  even  though  this  alien  may 
be  held  in  much  esteem.  The  son  of  John 
Lockwood  Kipling,  professor  of  architec- 
tural sculpture  in  the  British  School  of 
Art  at  Bombay,  and  of  a  sister  of  Edward 
Burne-Jones,  it  was  not  strange  that  this 
boy  should  have  developed  strong  powers 
of  imagination  or  that  his  mind  should  have 
sought  relief  in  literary  expression. 

The  school  days  of  Kipling  were  spent 
at  Westward  Ho,  in  Devon,  where,  though 
he  failed  to  distinguish  himself  in  his  stud- 
ies, he  established  a  reputation  as  a  clever 


KIPLING'S  BEST  STORIES  AND  POEMS 

writer  of  verse  and  prose.  He  also  enjoyed 
in  these  formative  years  the  friendship  and 
counsel  of  Burne-Jones,  and  he  had  the 
use  of  several  fine  private  libraries.  His 
wide  reading  probably  injured  his  school 
standing,  but  it  was  of  enormous  benefit  to 
him  in  his  future  literary  work.  At  seven- 
teen young  Kipling  returned  to  India, 
where  he  secured  a  position  on  the  CIVIL 
AND  MILITARY  GAZETTE  of  Lahore,  where 
his  father  was  principal  of  a  large  school 
of  arts. 

The  Anglo-Indian  newspaper  is  not  a 
model,  but  it  afforded  a  splendid  field  for 
the  development  of  Kipling's  abilities.  He 
was  not  only  a  reporter  of  the  ordinary 
occurrences  of  his  station,  but  he  was  con- 
stantly called  upon  to  write  short  sketches 
and  poems  to  fill  certain  corners  in  the 
paper,  that  varied  in  size  according  to  the 
number  and  length  of  the  advertisements. 

O 

Some  of  the  best  of  his  short  sketches  and 
bits  of  verse  were  written  hurriedly  on  the 
composing  stone  to  satisfy  such  needs. 
These  sketches  and  poems  he  published 
himself  and  sent  them  to  subscribers  in  all 
parts  of  India,  but  though  their  cleverness 
was  recognized  by  Anglo-Indians,  they  did 
not  appeal  to  the  general  public.  After 

[H3] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

five  years'  work  at  Lahore,  Kipling  was 
transferred  to  the  ALLAHABAoPiONEER,one 
of  the  most  important  of  the  Anglo-Indian 
journals.  For  the  weekly  edition  of  this 
paper  he  wrote  many  verses  and  sketches 
and  also  served  as  special  correspondent  in 
various  parts  of  India. 

It  was  in  1889  that  the  PIONEER  sent 
him  on  a  tour  of  the  world  and  he  wrote 
the  series  of  letters  afterwards  reprinted 
under  the  title  From  Sea  to  Sea.  Kipling, 
like  Stevenson,  had  to  have  a  story  to  tell 
to  bring  out  all  his  powers;  hence  these 
letters  are  not  among  his  best  work. 

Vividly  do  I  recall  Kipling's  visit  to  San 
Francisco.  He  came  into  the  CHRONICLE 
office  and  was  keenly  interested  in  the  fine 
collections  which  made  this  newspaper's 
library  before  the  fire  the  most  valuable  on 
this  Coast,  if  not  in  the  country.  He  was 
also  much  impressed  with  the  many  devices 
for  securing  speed  in  typesetting  and  other 
mechanical  work.  The  only  feature  of  his 
swarthy  face  that  impressed  one  was  his 
brilliant  black  eyes,  which  behind  his  large 
glasses,  seemed  to  note  every  detail.  He 
talked  very  well,  but  although  he  made 
friends  among  local  newspapermen,  he  was 
unsuccessful  in  selling  any  of  his  stories  to 

[H4] 


RUDYARD  KIPLING 
FROM  A  CARTOON  BY  W.  NICHOLSON 


KIPLING'S  BEST  STORIES  AND  POEMS 

the  editors  of  the  Sunday  supplements. 
He  soon  went  to  New  York,  but  there 
also  he  failed  to  dispose  of  his  stories. 

Finally  Kipling  reached  London  in  Sep- 
tember, 1889,  and  after  several  months  of 
discouragement,  he  induced  a  large  pub- 
lishing house  to  bring  out  Plain  Tales  From 
the  Hills.  It  scored  an  immediate  success. 
Like  Byron,  the  unknown  young  writer 
awoke  to  find  himself  famous:  magazine 

'  O 

editors  clamored  for  his  stories  at  fancy 
prices  and  publishers  eagerly  sought  his 
work.  It  may  be  said  to  Kipling's  credit 
that  he  did  not  utilize  this  opportunity  to 
make  money  out  of  his  sudden  reputation. 
He  doubtless  worked  over  many  old 
sketches,  but  he  put  his  best  into  what- 
ever he  gave  the  public.  He  married  the 
sister  of  Wolcott  Balestier,  a  brilliant 
American  who  became  very  well  known 
in  London  as  a  publishers'  agent,  and  after 
Balestier's  death  Kipling  moved  to  his 
wife's  old  home  in  Brattleboro,  Vermont, 
where  he  built  a  fine  country  house;  but 
constant  trouble  with  a  younger  brother 
of  his  wife  caused  him  to  abandon  this 
American  home  and  go  back  to  England, 

O  O  * 

where  he  set  up  his  lares  at  Rottingdean, 
in  Surrey,  There  he  has  remained,  aver- 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

aging  a  book  a  year,  until  now  he  has  over 
twenty-five  large  volumes  to  his  credit.  In 
1907  Kipling  was  given  the  Nobel  prize 
"for  the  best  work  of  an  idealist  tendency." 

In  reading  Kipling  it  is  best  to  begin 
with  some  of  the  tales  written  in  his  early 
life,  for  these  he  has  never  surpassed  in 
vigor  and  interest.  Take,  for  instance, 
Without  Benefit  of  Clergy,  The  Man  Who 
Was,  The  Drums  of  the  Fore  and  Aft,  The 
Man  Who  Would  Be  King  and  Beyond  the 
Pale.  These  stories  all  deal  with  Anglo- 
Indian  life,  two  with  the  British  soldier 
and  the  other  three  with  episodes  in  the 
lives  of  British  officials  and  adventurers. 

The  Man  Who  Would  Be  King,  the  finest 
of  all  Kipling's  tales  of  Anglo-Indian  life 
and  adventure,  is  the  story  of  the  fatal 
ambition  of  Daniel  Dravot,  told  by  the 
man  who  accompanied  him  into  the  wildest 
part  of  Afghanistan.  Daniel  made  the 
natives  believe  that  he  was  a  god  and  he 
could  have  ruled  them  as  a  king  had  he 
not  foolishly  become  enamored  of  a  native 
beauty.  This  girl  was  prompted  by  a  native 
soothsayer  to  bite  Dravot  in  order  to  decide 
whether  he  was  a  god  or  merely  human. 
The  blood  that  she  drew  on  his  neck  was 
ample  proof  of  his  spurious  claims  and  the 

[,46] 


KIPLING'S  BEST  STORIES  AND  POEMS 

two  adventurers  were  chased  for  miles 
through  a  wild  country.  When  captured 
Daniel  is  forced  to  walk  upon  a  bridge,  the 
ropes  of  which  are  then  cut,  and  his  body 
is  hurled  hundreds  of  feet  down  upon  the 
rocks.  The  story  of  the  survivor,  who 
escaped  after  crucifixion,  is  one  of  the 
ghastliest  tales  in  all  literature. 

Other  tales  that  Kipling  has  written  of 
Indian  life  are  scarcely  inferior  to  these  in 
strange,  uncanny  power.  One  of  the  weird- 
est relates  the  adventures  of  an  army  officer 
who  fell  into  the  place  where  those  who 
have  been  legally  declared  dead,  but  who 
have  recovered,  pass  their  lives.  As  a  pic- 
ture of  hell  on  earth  it  has  never  been 
surpassed.  Another  of  Kipling's  Indian 
tales  that  is  worth  reading  is  William  the 
Conqueror ',  a  love  story  that  has  a  back- 
ground of  grim  work  during  the  famine 
year. 

One  of  Kipling's  claims  to  fame  is  that 
he  has  drawn  the  British  soldier  in  India 
as  he  actually  lives.  His  Soldiers  Three— 
Mulvaney,  the  Irishman,  Ortheris,  the 
cockney,  and  Learoyd,  the  Yorkshireman— 
are  so  full  of  real  human  nature  that  they 
delight  all  men  and  many  women.  Mul- 
vaney is  the  finest  creation  of  Kipling,  and 

[147] 


MODERN  ENGLISH  BOOKS  OF  POWER 

most  of  his  stones  are  brimful  of  Irish 
wit.  Of  late  years  Kipling  has  written 
some  fine  imaginative  stories,  such  as  'The 
Brushwood  Boy,  'They  and  An  Habitation 
Enforced.  He  has  also  revealed  his  genius 
in  such  tales  of  the  future  as  With  the  Night 
Mail,  a  remarkably  graphic  sketch  of  a  voy- 
age across  the  Atlantic  in  a  single  night  in 
a  great  aeroplane.  Another  side  of  Kip- 
ling's genius  is  seen  in  his  Jungle  Stories, 
in  which  all  the  wild  animals  are  endowed 
with  speech.  Mowgli,  the  boy  who  is 
suckled  by  a  wolf,  is  a  distinct  creation, 
and  his  adventures  are  full  of  interest. 
Compare  these  stories  with  the  work  of 
Thompson-Seton  and  you  get  a  good  idea 
of  the  genius  of  Kipling  in  making  real  the 
savage  struggle  for  life  in  the  Indian  jungle. 

Of  Kipling's  long  novels  'The  Naulakha 
ranks  first  for  interest  of  plot,  but  Kim  is 
the  best  because  of  its  series  of  wonderful 
pictures  of  East  Indian  life  and  character. 
Captains  Courageous  is  a  story  of  Cape  Cod 
fishing  life,  with  an  improbable  plot  but 
much  good  description  of  the  perils  and 
hardships  of  the  men  who  seek  fortune  on 
the  fishing  banks. 

As  a  poet  Kipling  appeals  strongly  to 
men  who  love  the  life  of  action  and  adven- 


KIPLING'S  BEST  STORIES  AND  POEMS 

ture  in  all  parts  of  the  world.  In  his 
Departmental  Ditties  he  has  painted  the 
life  of  the  British  soldier  and  the  civilian 
in  India,  and  his  Danny  Dever,  his  Man- 
dalay  and  others  which  sing  themselves 
have  passed  into  the  memory  of  the  great 
public  that  seldom  reads  any  verse  unless 
it  be  the  words  of  a  popular  song.  The 
range  of  his  verse  is  very  wide,  whether  it 
is  the  superb  imagery  in  'The  Last  Chantey 
or  the  impressive  Galvanism  of Me  Andrew's 
Hymn.  His  Recessional,  of  course,  is  known 
to  everyone.  It  is  one  of  the  finest  bits  of 
verse  printed  in  the  last  twenty  years. 

Kipling,  in  spite  of  his  many  volumes, 
is  only  forty-six  years  old,  and  he  may  be 
counted  on  to  do  much  more  good  work. 

If  he  turns  to  historical  fiction  he  may 
yet  do  for  English  history  what  the  author 
of  Waverley  has  done  for  the  history  of 
Scotland.  Certainly  he  has  the  finest  cre- 
ative imagination  of  his  age;  in  whatever 
domain  it  may  work  it  is  sure  to  produce 
literature  that  will  live. 


['49] 


Bibliography 


Short  Notes  of  Both  Standard  and  Other 
Editions,  With  Lives,  Sketches  and 
Reminiscences. 

<•  j HESE  bibliographical  notes  on  the  authors 
<*-  discussed  in  this  volume  are  brief  because 
the  space  allotted  to  them  was  limited.  'They 
are  designed  to  mention  the  first  complete  edi- 
tions—the standard  editions— as  well  as  the 
lives  of  authors,  estimates  of  their  works  and 
sketches  and  personal  reminiscences.  A  mass 
of  good  material  on  the  great  writers  of  the 
Viftorian  age  is  buried  in  the  bound  volumes 
of  English  and  American  reviews  and  maga- 
zines. 'The  best  guide  to  these  articles  is 
Pooles  "Index." 

The  most  valuable  single  volumes  to  one 
who  wishes  to  make  a  study  of  eighteenth  and 
nineteenth  century  English  writers  are:  "A 
Stud*  of  English  Prose  Writers'  and  "A 
Stu:y  of  English  and  American  Poets"  by 
J.  Scott  Clark.  (New  Tork:  Charles  Scrib- 
ner's  Sons.  Price,  $2  net  a  volume.)  These  two 
volumes  will  give  any  one  who  wishes  to  make 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

a  study  of  the  authors  I  have  discussed  the 
material  for  a  mastery  of  their  works.  Under 
full  biographical  sketches  the  author  gives 
estimates  of  the  best  critics,  extracts  from  their 
works  and  a  full  bibliography,  including  the 
best  magazine  articles. 

MACAULAY 

The  editions  of  Macaulay  are  so  numerous  that  it  is 
useless  to  attempt  to  enumerate  them.  A  standard  edi- 
tion was  collected  in  I  866  by  his  sister,  Lady  Trevelyan. 
Four  volumes  are  devoted  to  the  history  and  three  to 
the  essays  and  lives  of"  famous  authors  which  he  wrote 
for  the  Encyclopedia  Brittanica,  Macaulay's  essays, 
which  have  enjoyed  the  greatest  popularity  in  this 
country,  may  be  found  in  many  forms.  A  one-volume 
edition,  containing  the  principal  essays,  is  issued  by  sev- 
eral publishers.  Sir  George  Otto  Trevelyan' s  The  Life 
and  Letters  of  Lord  Macaulay  in  two  volumes  (  i  876) 
is  a  more  interesting  biography  than  Lockhart's  Scott. 
The  best  single-volume  estimate  of  Macaulay  is  J.  Cot- 
ter Morison's  Macaulay  in  the  English  Men  of  Letter's 
series.  Good  short  critical  sketches  of  Macaulay  and 
his  work  may  be  found  in  Sir  Leslie  Stephen's  Hours 
in  a  Library,  volume  2,  and  in  Lord  Morley's  Critical 
Miscellanies,  volume  2. 

SCOTT 

The  edition  of  Scott,  which  was  his  own  favorite, 
was  issued  in  Edinburgh  in  forty-eight  volumes,  from 
1829  to  1833.  Scott  wrote  new  prefaces  and  notes 
for  this  edition.  Another  is  the  Border  edition,  with 
introductory  essays  and  notes  by  Andrew  Lang  (forty- 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

eight  volumes,  1892-1894).  The  recent  editions  of 
Scott  are  numerous  for,  despite  all  criticisms  of  his 
careless  style,  he  holds  his  own  with  the  popular  favor- 
ites of  the  day.  Of  his  poems  a  good  edition  was 
edited  by  William  Minto  in  two  volumes,  in  1888. 
The  Life  of  Scott  by  his  son-in-law,  J.  G.  Lockhart,  is 
the  standard  work.  This  was  originally  issued  in  seven 
volumes  but  Lockhart  was  induced  to  condense  it  into 
one  volume,  which  gives  about  all  that  the  ordinary 
reader  cares  for.  This  may  be  found  in  Everyman's 
library.  Scott's  Journal  and  his  Familiar  Letters,  both 
edited  by  David  Douglas,  contain  much  interesting 
material.  The  best  short  lives  of  Scott  are  by  R.  H. 
Hutton  in  the  English  Men  of  Letters  series  and  by 
George  Saintsbury  in  the  Famous  Scots  series.  Among 
the  best  sketches  and  estimates  of  Scott  are  by  Andrew 
Lang  in  Letters  to  Dead  Authors;  Sir  Leslie  Stephen 
in  Hours  in  a  Library;  Conan  Doyle  in  Through  the 
Magic  Door;  Walter  Bagehot  in  Literary  Studies;  Ste- 
venson in  Gossip  on  Romance  and  in  Memoirs  and  Por- 
traits, and  S.  R.  Crockett  in  The  Scott  Country. 
Abbotsford,  by  Washington  Irving,  gives  the  best  per- 
sonal sketches  of  Scott  at  home. 

CARLYLE 

Carlyle's  Essays  and  his  French  Revolution,  upon 
which  his  fame  will  chiefly  rest,  are  issued  in  many 
editions.  It  would  be  well  if  his  longer  works  could 
be  condensed  into  single  volumes  by  competent  hands. 
A  revised  edition  of  his  Frederick  was  issued  in  one 
short  volume.  For  the  facts  of  Carlyle's  life,  the  best 
book  is  his  own  Reminiscences  issued  in  1881  and  edited 
by  Froude,  who  was  his  literary  executor  with  the  full 
power  to  publish  or  suppress.  Froude  had  so  great 


['S3] 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

an  antipathy  to  what  Carlyle  himself  called  "mealy- 
mouthed  biography"  that  he  erred  on  the  side  of  extreme 
frankness.  In  Thomas  Carlyle— The  First  Forty  Tears 
of  His  Life,  Life  in  London  and  Letters  of 'Jane  Welsh 
Carlyle,  Froude  permitted  the  publication  of  many  mali- 
cious comments  by  Carlyle  on  his  famous  contemporaries. 
These  and  morbid  expressions  of  remorse  by  Carlyle 
over  imaginary  neglect  of  his  wife  caused  a  great  revulsion 
of  public  sentiment  and  the  fame  of  Carlyle  was  clouded 
for  ten  years.  Finally,  after  much  acrimonious  contro- 
versy, the  truth  prevailed  and  Carlyle  came  into  his 
own  again. 

Among  the  best  books  on  Carlyle  are  Lowell's 
Essays,  volume  2;  David  Masson,  Carlyle  Personally 
and  in  His  Writings;  E.  P.  Whipple,  Essays  and  Re- 
views; Emerson,  English  Traits;  Lowell,  My  Study 
Windows;  Morley,  English  Literature  in  the  Reign  of 
Victoria;  Greg,  Literary  and  Social  Judgments;  Mon- 
cure  Conway,  Carlyle,  and  Henley,  Views  and  Reviews. 

Among  magazine  and  review  articles  may  be  men- 
tioned George  Eliot  in  WESTMINSTER  REVIEW,  volume 
57 ;  John  Burroughs  in  ATLANTIC  MONTHLY, volume  5  I ; 
Emerson  in  SCRIBNER'S  MAGAZINE,  volume  22;  Froude 
in  NINETEENTH  CENTURY,  volume  10,  and  Leslie  Ste- 
phen in  CORNHILL,  volume  44. 

DE  QUINCEY 

It  is  a  curious  fact  that  the  first  complete  edition  of 
De  Quincey's  works  was  issued  in  Boston  in  twenty 
volumes  (1850-1855)  by  Ticknor  &  Fields.  Much  of 
the  material  was  gathered  from  English  periodicals,  as 
De  Quincey  was  the  greatest  magazine  writer  of  his 
age.  This  was  followed  by  the  Riverside  edition  in 
twelve  volumes  (Boston,  1 877).  The  standard  English 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

edition  is  The  Collected  Writings  of  Thomas  De  Quincey, 
fourteen  volumes,  edited  by  David  Masson  (1889- 
1890).  A.  H.  Japp  wrote  the  standard  English  Life 
of  De  Quincey  (London,  two  volumes,  1879).  The 
best  short  life  is  Masson's  in  the  English  Men  of  Let- 
ters series.  George  Saintsbury  gives  a  good  sketch  of 
De  Quincey  in  Essays  in  English  Literature.  Other 
estimates  may  be  found  in  the  following  works:  Leslie 
Stephen,  Hours  in  a  Library;  H.  A.  Page,  De  Quin- 
cey,  His  Life  and  Writings  and  in  Mrs.  Oliphant's 
Literary  History  of  England. 

LAMB 

Reprints  of  the  Essays  of  Elia  have  been  very 
numerous.  One  of  the  best  editions  of  Lamb's  com- 
plete works  was  edited  by  E.  V.  Lucas  in  seven  vol- 
umes, to  which  he  added  in  1905  The  Life  of  Charles 
Lamb  in  two  volumes.  Another  is  Complete  Works  and 
Correspondence,  edited  by  Canon  Ainger  (London,  six 
volumes).  Ainger  also  wrote  an  excellent  short  life  of 
Lamb  for  the  English  Men  of  Letters  series.  Hazlitt 
and  Percy  Fitzgerald  have  revised  Thomas  Noon  Tal- 
fourd's  standard  Letters  of  Charles  Lamb,  Wit  ha  Sketch 
of  His  Life.  Among  sketches  of  the  life  of  Charles  and 
Mary  Lamb  may  be  noted  Barry  Cornwall's  Charles 
Lamb— A  Memoir;  Fitzgerald,  Charles  Lamb:  His 
Friends,  His  Haunts  and  His  Books;  Walter  Pater, 
Appreciations;  R.  H.  Stoddard,  Personal  Recolleclions; 
Augustine  Birrell,  Res  Judicatce;  Nicoll,  Landmarks 
of  English  Literature;  Talfourd,  Final  Memorials  of 
Charles  Lamb;  Hutton,  Literary  Landmarks  of  London. 

DICKENS 

The  first  colleftive  edition  of  Dickens'  works  was 
issued  in  1847.  The  standard  edition  is  that  of  Chap- 


['55] 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

man  &  Hall,  London,  who  were  the  original  publishers 
of  Pickwick.  One  of  the  best  of  the  many  editions  of 
Dickens  is  the  Macmillan  Pocket  edition  with  repro- 
ductions of  the  original  covers  of  the  monthly  parts  of 
the  novels  as  they  appeared,  the  original  illustrations 
by  Cruikshank,  Leech,  "Phiz"(Hablot  Browne)  and 
others,  and  valuable  and  interesting  introductions  by 
Charles  Dickens  the  younger.  Another  good  edition  is 
in  the  World's  Classics,  with  brilliant  introductions  by 
G.  K.  Chesterton.  In  buying  an  edition  of  Dickens 
it  is  well  to  get  one  with  reproductions  of  the  original 
illustrations,  as  these  add  much  to  the  pleasure  and 
interest  of  the  novels. 

For  ready  reference  to  Dickens'  works  there  is  a 
Dickens  Dictionary,  giving  the  names  of  all  characters 
and  places  in  the  novels,  by  G.  A.  Pierce,  and  another 
similar  work  by  A.  J.  Philip.  Mary  Williams  has  also 
prepared  a  Dickens  Concordance. 

Forster's  Life  of  Charles  Dickens,  in  three  volumes, 
is  the  standard  work,  as  Forster  was  closely  connected 
with  the  nevelist  from  the  time  he  made  his  hit  with 
Pickwick.  George  Gissing,  the  novelist,  made  an 
abridgment  of  Forster's  Life  in  one  volume,  which  is 
well  done.  Scores  of  shorter  lives  and  sketches  have 
been  written.  Among  the  best  of  these  are  Dr.  A.W. 
Ward's  Charles  Dickens  in  the  English  Men  of  Letters 
series;  Taine's  chapter  on  Dickens  in  his  History  of 
English  Literature;  Sir  Leslie  Stephen's  article  in  the 
Dictionary  of  National  Biography;  Mrs.  Oliphant's  The 
Victorian  Age  in  English  Literature;  F.  G.  Kitten's 
Charles  Dickens:  His  Life,  Writings  and  Personality. 
The  Letters,  edited  by  Miss  Hogarth  and  Mary  Dick- 
ens, are  valuable  for  the  light  they  throw  on  the  novel- 
ist's character  and  work. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

In  reminiscence  of  Dickens,  the  best  books  are  Mary- 
Dickens'  My  Father  as  I  Recall  Him;  J.  T.  Fields' 
///  and  Out  of  Doors  With  Charles  Dickens  and  G.  Dol- 
by's Charles  Dickens  as  I  Knezu  Him,  the  last  devoted 
to  the  famous  reading  tours.  Edmund  Yates,  Anthony 
Trollope,  James  Payn,  R.  H.  Haine  and  many  others 
have  written  readable  reminiscences. 

For  the  home  life  of  Dickens  and  his  haunts  see  F.  G. 
Kitton's  The  Dickens  Country,-  Thomas  Fort's  //;  Kent 
With  Charles  Dickens  and  H.  S.  Ward's  The  Real 
Dickens  Land.  Of  poems  on  Dickens'  death  the  very 
best  is  Bret  Harte's  Dickens  in  Camp.  The  Wisdom  of 
Dickens,  compiled  by  Temple  Scott,  is  a  good  collection 
of  extracts. 

THACKERAY 

Almost  as  many  editions  of  Thackeray's  works  have 
been  published  as  of  Dickens'  novels,  and  the  reader  in 
his  selection  must  be  guided  largely  by  his  own  taste. 
In  choosing  an  edition,  however,  always  get  one  that 
contains  Thackeray's  own  illustrations,  as,  though  the 
drawing  is  frequently  crude,  the  sketches  are  full  of 
humor  and  help  one  to  understand  the  author's  con- 
ception of  the  characters.  The  best  general  edition  is 
The  Biographical,  with  introductions  by  his  daughter, 
Mrs.  Richmond  Ritchie  (London,  i  897-1900).  The 
Charterhouse  edition  of  Thackeray  in  twenty-six  vol- 
umes, published  in  England  by  Smith,  Elder  &  Co.  and 
in  this  country  by  Lippincott,  is  an  excellent  library  set 
containing  all  the  original  illustrations. 

No  regular  biography  of  Thackeray  has  ever  been 
written  because  of  his  expressed  wish,  but  his  daughter, 
Mrs.  Richmond  Ritchie,  has  supplied  this  lack  with 
many  sketches  and  introductions  to  various  editions  of 


['57] 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

her  father's  works.  Anthony  Trollope  in  his  autobiog- 
raphy gives  many  charming  glimpses  of  Thackeray  but 
his  sketch  of  Thackeray  in  the  English  Men  of  Letters 
series  is  not  warmly  appreciative. 

One  of  the  best  short  estimates  of  Thackeray  is 
Charles  Whibley's  Thackeray  (1905).  Also  valuable 
are  sketches  by  Frederic  Harrison  in  Early  Victorian 
Literature;  Brownell,  Early  Vitlorian  Masters;  Whip- 
pie,  Charatler  and  Characteristic  Men;  R.  H.  Stod- 
dard,  Anecdote  Biography  of  Thackeray;  Andrew  Lang, 
Letters  to  Dead  Authors;  G.  T.  Fields,  Yesterdays 
With  Authors;  Jeaffreson,  Novels  and  Novelists  and 
W.  B.  Jerrold  The  Best  of  All  Good  Company. 

The  reviews  and  magazines,  especially  in  the  last 
ten  years,  have  abounded  in  articles  on  Thackeray. 
Among  these  the  best  have  appeared  in  SCRIBNER'S 
MAGAZINE.  A  small  volume,  The  Sense  and  Sentiment 
of  Thackeray  (Harper's,  1909),  gives  numerous  good 
extracts  from  the  novels  as  well  as  from  the  essays. 

CHARLOTTE  BRONTE 

Smith,  Elder  &  Co.  of  London  were  the  publishers 
of  Jane  Eyre  and  they  also  issued  the  first  collected 
edition  of  Charlotte  Bronte's  works.  This  firm  still 
publishes  the  standard  English  edition,  the  Haworth  edi- 
tion, with  admirable  introductions  by  Mrs.  Humphrey 
Ward  and  with  many  illustrations  from  photographs  of 
the  places  and  people  made  memorable  in  Charlotte's 
novels.  A  good  American  edition  is  the  Shirley  edi- 
tion, with  excellent  illustrations,  many  of  them  repro- 
ductions of  rare  daguerreotypes. 

The  standard  life  of  Charlotte  Bronte  until  fifteen 
years  ago  was  Mrs.  Gaskell's,  one  of  the  most  appeal- 
ing stories  in  all  literature.  Clement  K.  Shorter's 


[158] 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Charlotte  Bronte  and  Her  Circle  is  now  indispensable 
because  of  the  mass  of  fafts  that  the  author  has  gathered 
in  regard  to  the  life  of  the  sisters  in  the  lonely  parsonage 
and  their  remarkable  literary  development.  Augustine 
Birrell  has  written  a  good  short  life  of  Charlotte,  while 
A.  M.  F.  Robinson  (Mme.  Duclaux)  has  a  volume  on 
Emily  Bronte  in  the  Famous  Women  series. 

T.  Wemyss  Reid  was  the  first  writer  to  make  orig- 
inal research  among  the  Bronte  material  and  his  book, 
Charlotte  Bronte— A  Monograph,  paved  the  way  for  the 
exhaustive  study  of  this  strange  family  of  genius  by 
Clement  Shorter.  Other  books  that  give  much  original 
material  are  The  Brontes  in  Ireland,  by  Rev.  Dr. 
William  Wright,  and  Charlotte  Bronte  and  HerSistersy 
by  Clement  Shorter.  Mr.  Shorter  also  in  The  Brontes- 
Life  and  Letters  gives  all  of  Charlotte's  letters  in  the 
order  of  their  dates. 

GEORGE  ELIOT 

The  first  collected  edition  of  George  Eliot's  works 
was  brought  out  in  1878-1880  in  London  and  Edin- 
burgh. Many  editions  have  since  appeared  in  England 
and  in  this  country,  the  best  one  being  the  English 
Cabinet  edition,  published  by  A.  &  C.  Black. 

The  standard  life  of  George  Eliot  is  George  Eliot's 
Life  as  Related  in  Her  Letters  and  Journals,  edited  by 
her  husband,  J.  W.  Cross,  who  served  for  ten  years 
as  curate  of  Haworth.  Leslie  Stephen  has  written  a 
remarkably  good  short  life  of  George  Eliot  in  the  English 
Men  of  Letters  series. 

Among  critical  articles  on  George  Eliot  may  be  men- 
tioned Henry  James  in  Partial  Portraits;  Mathilde 
Blind,  George  Eliot;  Oscar  Browning,  Life  of  George 
Eliot  in  Great  Writers  series;  Dowden,  Studies  in  Lit- 
erature; Oscar  Browning,  Great  Writers;  Mayo  W. 


['59] 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Hazeltine,  Chats  About  Books;  R.  H.  Hutton,  Mod- 
ern Guides  of  Religious  Thought;  R.  E.  Cleveland, 
George  Eliot'1!  Poetry;  Frederic  Harrison,  The  Choice 
of  Books  and  Sydney  Lanier,  The  Development  of  the 
English  Novel. 

RUSKIN 

The  great  edition  of  Ruskin  is  the  Library  edition 
by  E.  T.  Cook  and  A.  Wedderburn,  begun  in  1903. 
It  is  splendidly  illustrated  and  is  a  superb  specimen  of 
book-making.  English  and  American  editors  of  Ruskin 
are  numerous. 

The  standard  life  of  Ruskin  is  by  W.  G.  Colling- 
wood,  his  secretary  and  ardent  disciple.  One  of  his 
pupils,  E.  T.  Cook,  published  Studies  in  Ruskin,  which 
throws  much  light  on  his  methods  of  teaching  art.  J.  A. 
Hobson  in  John  Ruskin,  Social  Reformer  discusses  his 
economic  and  social  teaching.  Dr.  Charles  Waldstein 
of  Cambridge  in  The  Work  of  John  Ruskin  develops 
his  art  theories.  Good  critical  studies  may  also  be  found 
in  W.  M.  Rossetti's  Ruskin  and  Frederic  Harrison's 
Tennyson,  Ruskin,  Mill  and  Other  Literary  Estimates; 
Justin  McCarthy,  Modern  Leaders;  Mary  R.  Mitford, 
Recolleftions  of  a  Literary  Life  and  R.  H.  Hutton, 
Contemporary  Thought  and  Thinkers. 

Among  magazine  articles  may  be  noted  W.  J.  Still- 
man  in  the  CENTURY,  volume  1 3 ;  Charles  Waldstein  in 
HARPER'S,  volume  1 8 ;  Justin  McCarthy  in  the  GALAXY, 
volume  13,  and  Leslie  Stephen  in  FRAZER'S,  volumes 
9  and  49. 

TENNYSON 

The  best  edition  of  Tennyson  is  the  Eversley  in  six 
volumes,  published  by  the  Macmillans  and  edited  by 
his  son  Hallam,  which  contains  a  mass  of  notes  left  by 


[160] 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

the  poet  and  many  explanations  of  peculiar  words  and 
metaphors  which  the  father  gave  to  the  son  in  discussing 
his  work.  This  edition  also  gives  the  changes  made  by 
the  poet  in  his  constant  revision  of  his  works,  some  of 
which  were  not  improvements. 

A  mass  of  critical  commentary  and  reminiscence  has 
been  published  on  Tennyson  and  his  poetical  work. 
Among  the  best  of  these  volumes  are  Tennyson,  Ruskin 
and  Mill,  by  Frederic  Harrison;  Tennyson  and  His 
Friends,  by  Mrs.  Richmond  Ritchie;  THe  Homes  and 
Haunts  of  Tennyson,  by  Napier;  Tennyson,  His  Art  and 
Relation  to  Modern  Life,  by  Stopford  A.  Brooke;  The 
Poetry  of  Tennyson,  by  Henry  Van  Dyke;  the  chapter 
on  Tennyson  in  Stedman's  Viftorian  Poets;  a  commen- 
tary on  Tennyson's  //;  Memoriam  by  Prof.  A.  C. 
Bradley;  Alfred  Tennyson,  by  Andrew  Lang;  Views 
and  Reviews,  by  W.  E.  Henley;  Yesterdays  With  Au- 
thors, by  J.  T.  Fields;  The  Vittorian  Age,  by  Mrs. 
Oliphant.  Dr.  Henry  Van  Dyke  contributed  five  articles 
on  Tennyson  to  SCRIBNER'S  MAGAZINE,  volume  6. 

BROWNING 

An  enormous  li;erature  of  comment,  appreciation  and 
interpretation  has  grown  up  around  Browning,  largely 
due  to  the  work  of  various  Browning  societies  in  this 
country  and  in  Europe.  The  London  Browning  Society 
especially  has  brought  out  many  papers  that  will  be  of 
interest  to  Browning  students.  Other  works  are  Arthur 
Symons,  IntroduSion  to  the  Study  of  Browning  (Lon- 
don, 1886);  G.  W.  Cooke,  Browning  Guide  Book 
(New  York,  1901 );  Fotheringham,  Studies  (London, 
1898);  Stedman,  Vittorian  Poets;  Prof.  Hiram  Cor- 
son,  Introduflion  to  Browning;  George  E.  Woodberry, 
Studies  in  Literature  and  Life;  Hamilton  W.  Mabie, 


[161] 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Essays  in  Literary  Interpretation;  A.  Birrell,  Obiter 
Difia;  George  Saintsbury,  Corrected  Impressions, 

The  first  edition  of  Browning's  poems  appeared  in 
two  volumes  in  1 849,  a  second  in  three  volumes  in 
1863  and  a  third  in  six  volumes  in  1868.  A  revised 
edition  containing  all  the  poems  was  issued  in  sixteen 
volumes  in  1888-1889.  A  fine  complete  edition  in  two 
volumes,  edited  by  Augustine  Birreil  and  F.  G.  Ken- 
yon,  was  issued  in  1896,  and  Smith,  Elder  &  Co., 
London,  brought  out  a  two-volume  edition  in  1 900. 
In  this  country  the  Riverside  edition  of  Browning's 
Poetical  Works  in  six  volumes,  issued  by  Houghton, 
MifHin  &  Co.,  and  the  Camberwell  edition  in  twelve 
handy  volumes,  with  notes  by  Charlotte  Porter  and 
Helen  A.  Clarke,  published  by  Crowell,  are  valuable 
for  Browning  students. 

The  standard  life  is  The  Life  and  Letters  of  Robert 
Browning,  by  Mrs.  Sutherland  Orr,  but  valuable  are 
The  Love  Letters  of  Robert  Browning  and  Elizabeth 
Barrett  Browning,  issued  by  Browning's  son  in  i  899. 
For  Edmund  Gosse's  Robert  Browning— Personalia  the 
poet  supplied  much  of  the  material  in  notes.  Good 
short  sketches  and  estimates  are  Chesterton's  Browning 
in  the  English  Men  of  Letters  series  and  Waugh's 
Robert  Browning. 

GEORGE  MEREDITH 

The  standard  edition  of  Meredith's  works  is  the 
Boxhill  edition  in  seventeen  volumes,  with  photogravure 
frontispieces,  issued  in  this  country  by  the  Scribners. 
The  same  text  is  used  in  the  Pocket  Edition  in  sixteen 
volumes,  which  does  not  include  the  unfinished  novel, 
Celt  and  Saxon.  A  mass  of  comment  on  Meredith  may 
be  found  in  the  English  and  American  reviews  and  maga- 
zines, to  which  Poole's  Index  furnishes  the  best  guide. 


[162] 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

Mrs.  M.  S.  Henderson,  George  Meredith:  Novelist, 
Poet,  Reformer;  George  Macaulay  Trevelyan,  The 
Poetry  and  Philosophy  of  George  Meredith;  John  Lane, 
Biography  of  George  Meredith,  and  R.  Le  Gallienne, 
Charafieristics  of  George  Meredith. 

STEVENSON 

Robert  Louis  Stevenson's  early  work  appeared  in 
fugitive  form  in  magazines  and  reviews  and  even  after 
he  had  written  The  New  Arabian  Nights  and  Travels 
With  a  Donkey  he  was  forced  to  see  such  excellent 
matter  as  The  Silverado  Squatters  cut  up  into  magazine 
articles  and  more  than  half  of  it  discarded.  The  vogue 
of  Stevenson  was  greater  in  this  country  than  in  Eng- 
land until  he  had  fully  established  his  reputation.  Jn 
1878  An  Inland  Voyage  appeared  and  in  1879  Travels 
With  a  Donkey,  but  it  was  not  until  1883  that  Treasure 
Island  made  him  well  known.  The  standard  edition  of 
Stevenson  is  the  Thistle  edition,  beautifully  printed  and 
illustrated,  and  issued  at  Edinburgh  and  New  York, 
1894-1898.  The  Letters  of  Stevenson  to  His  Family, 
originally  issued  in  1899,  have  now  been  incorporated 
with  Vailima  Letters  and  issued  in  four  volumes.  They 
are  arranged  chronologically,  with  admirable  biograph- 
ical commentary  by  Sydney  Colvin,  to  whom  a  great  part 
of  them  was  written.  Stevenson's  personality  was  so  at- 
traftive  that  a  mass  of  reminiscence  and  comment  has 
been  produced  since  his  death  in  1894.  The  best  books 
are  Graham  Balfour,  Life  of  Robert  Louis  Stevenson; 
Walter  Raleigh,  R.  L.  Stevenson;  Simpson,  Stevenson's 
Edinburgh  A/V-r,  and  Memoirs  of  Vailima,  by  Isobel 
Strong  and  Lloyd  Osbourne,  the  novelist's  stepchildren. 
Henry  James  in  Partial  Portraits  has  a  fine  appreciation 
of  Stevenson  and  Robert  Louis  Stevenson  in  California, 
bv  Katharine  D.  Osbourne  is  rich  in  reminiscence. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 
THOMAS  HARDY 

Since  1895,  Thomas  Hardy  has  written  no  fiction. 
The  standard  edition  of  his  works  is  published  in  this 
country  by  the  Harpers.  Recently  this  firm  has  issued 
Hardy  in  a  convenient  thin  paper  edition  which  may 
be  slipped  into  the  coat  pocket.  His  first  novel,  Des- 
perate Remedies,  appeared  in  I  871  but  it  was  not  until 
the  issue  of  Far  From  the  Madding  Crowd  in  1874 
that  he  gained  popular  fame.  Many  magazine  articles 
have  been  written  on  the  "corner  of  Dorsetshire" 
which  Hardy  calls  Wessex.  Good  books  on  the  Hardy 
country  are  The  Wessex  of  Romance,  by  W.  Sherren, 
and  The  Wessex  of  Thomas  Hardy,  by  Windle. 

KIPLING 

The  standard  edition  of  Kipling  is  the  Outward 
Bound  edition,  published  in  this  country  by  the  Scrib- 
ners.  It  contains  a  general  introduction  by  the  author 
and  special  prefaces  to  each  volume,  with  illustrations 
from  bas  reliefs  made  by  the  novelist's  father.  Double- 
day,  Page  &  Co.  are  issuing  a  pocket  edition  of  Kipling, 
on  thin  paper  with  flexible  leather  binding,  which  is 
very  convenient.  Any  additional  books  will  be  added 
to  each  of  these  editions.  Kipling  has  told  of  his  early 
life  in  India  and  of  his  precocious  literary  activity  in 
My  First  Book  (1894).  Richard  Le  Gallienne  made 
a  study  of  the  novelist  in  Rudyard  Kipling— A  Criticism 
and  Edmund  Gosse  in  Questions  at  Issue  discusses  his 
short  stories.  Prof.  William  Lyon  Phelps  in  Essays  on 
Modern  Novelists  has  a  fine  chapter  on  Kipling.  Andrew 
Lang  in  Essays  in  Little  treats  of  "Mr.  Kipling's  Stor- 
ies" and  Barrie  has  an  appreciation  in  CONTEMPORARY 
REVIEW  for  March,  1891.  A  useful  Kip/ing  Index  is 
issued  by  Doubleday,  Page  &  Co.  All  titles  are  indexed 
so  that  one  may  locate  any  story  or  character. 


f:64] 


Index 


A  Blot  on  the  'Scutcheon, 

108,  i  10,  113. 
A  Child's  Garden  of 

Verse,  125. 
Adam   Bede,  65,  76,  82, 

84. 

Addison,  58. 
A  Dissertation  on  Roast 

Pig,  4J>  7i- 
A  Dream  of"  Fair  Women, 

99- 

Adventures  of  Philip,  The, 

60. 

Aes  Triplex,  130. 

Agnes  Gray,  7 1 . 

A  Gossip  on  Romance, 

130. 
A  Lodging  for  the  Night, 

124,  129. 

Alison  Cunningham,  125. 
Allahabad  Pioneer,  144. 
Amazing  Marriage,  The, 

122. 

An  English  Mail  Coach, 

31- 

An  Habitation  Enforced, 

148. 

An  Inland  Voyage,   I  26. 
Anglo-Indian  Life,  146. 
Antiquary, The,  1 8. 


A  Pair  of  Blue  Eyes,  135. 

Apostles,  99. 

Arnold,  I  1 6. 

Arthurian  Legends,  101. 

Ashburton,  Lady,  25. 

Ashby  de  la  Zouch,  17. 

Asolando,  1 08,  III. 

A  Soldier  of  France,  i  2. 

Asolo,  113. 

A  Soul's  Tragedy,  108, 

i  10,  113. 

ATaleofTwoCities,53. 
Austro-Italian  War,  118. 
A  Window  in  Thrums,  39. 

Balestier,  Wolcott,  145. 

Ballantyne,  16,  90. 

Balzac,  I  2. 

Balzac's  Seraphita,  74. 

Bank  of  England,  109. 

Barrett,  Elizabeth,  1 10. 

Barrie,  39. 

Bathsheba  Everdene,  I  36. 

Becket,  101 . 

Bells  and  Pomegranates, 

109. 

Beyond  the  Pale,  146. 
Biblical  Allusions,  139. 
Bleak  House,  54. 
Blue  Coat  School,  44. 


[165] 


INDEX 


Boldwood,  I  36. 

Boswell,  4. 

Bray,  Charles,  of  Coven- 
try, 80. 

Brantwood,  93. 

Break,  Break,  Break,  105. 

Bronte,  Charlotte,  xn,  66 
to  72. 

Bronte,  Emily,  68. 

Browning,  Robert,xn,97, 
103,  106  to  1 15,  i  17, 
118. 

Browning,  Mrs.,  1 10. 

Brushwood  Boy,  The, 
148. 

Bunyan,  28. 

Burne-Jones,  142,  143. 

Burns,  113. 

Byron,  7,  98,  109,  145. 

Cain,  98. 
California,  i  27. 
Galvanism,  149. 
Cape  Cod,  148. 
Captains  Courageous,  1 48. 
Carlyle, Thomas,  xn,  xm, 
3,  4,  8,  20  to  30,  43, 

^  52>  53»93; 

CasaGuidiWindows,  l  10. 

Cervantes,  I  I  . 
Chapman  &  Hall,  I  I  8. 
Charlotte,  68. 
Child  Angel,  The,  45. 
Childe  Harold,  7,  90. 
Choir  Invisible,  The,  85. 


Christmas  Carol,  5 1 . 
Christmas  Story,  5  i . 
Chronicle,  144. 
Clive,  4,  9. 
Cloister  and  the  Hearth, 

The,  65. 

Coleridge,  35,  42,43. 
Colombe's  Birthday,  i  10, 

-,  II3- 

Colonel  Newcome,  58. 

Confessions  of  an  English 
Opium  Eater,  36. 

Count  Robert  of  Paris,  I  8. 

Court  of  Chancery,  54. 

Cricket  on  the  Hearth, 
The,  51. 

Croker,  4. 

Cromwell,  24. 

Cross,].  W.,  82. 

Crossing  the  Bar,  98,  101, 

^  J°5'  II3'. 

Crown  of  Wild  Olives, 

The,  94. 

Dale  in  the  Alps,  94. 
Daniel  Deronda,  79,  82. 
Daniel  Dravot,  146. 
Danny  Dever,  149. 
David  and  Allan,  129. 
David  and  Catriona  in 

Holland,  I  29. 
David  B a! four,  I  28. 
David  Copperfield,  53, 

128. 
David  Warwick,  T  20. 


[166] 


INDEX 


Defoe,  62. 

Departmental  Ditties,  1 49. 
De  Quincey,  Thomas,  xn, 

30  to  38,  45,  93. 

Autobiography,  3  i . 

Confessions,  31,  32. 
Desperate  Remedies,  135. 
Dickens,  Charles,  xn,  i  3, 

44,  47  to  55,  61,  i  28. 
Dinah  Morris,  84. 
Diana  of  the  Crossways, 

115,1  20,  121,  122. 
Dombey  and  Son,  54. 
Don  Juan,  98. 
Doyle,  Conan,  I  2. 
Dramatic  Idylls,  I  I  I . 
Dramatic  Romances  and 

Lyrics,  I  10. 
Dream  Children,  xiv,  41, 

45- 
Dr.  Jekyll  and  Mr.  Hyde, 

i  25,  i  26,  i  28. 
Drums  of  the  Fore  and 

Aft,  The,  1 46. 
Dynasts,  The,  132. 

East  India  Life,  141. 
Edinburgh  Review,  4, 

23- 

Egdon  Heath,  133,  138. 
Egoist,  The,  121. 
Eliot,  George,  xn,  52,  76 

to  86,  i  36,  i  37. 
Emerson,  27,  I  16. 
English  History,  I  20. 


English  Humorists,  The, 

60. 

Enoch  Arden,  101. 
Esmond,  56. 
Essays  of  Elia,  40,  43. 
Eugenie  Grandet,  i  2. 
Eustacia,  i  36,  I  38. 
Evan  Harrington,  121. 
Evelyn  Hope,  113. 

Far    From    the    Madding 

Crowd,   133,  135, 

I36. 

Father  Damien,  I  24. 
Felix  Holt,  82. 
FifmeattheFair,  108, 1  I  I . 
Fiske,  Mrs. ,  in  Becky 

Sharp,  58,  I  38. 
Flight  of  the  Tartar  Tribe, 

The,  31. 

Fors  Clavigera,  92. 
Four  Georges,  The,  60. 
Fra  Lippo  Lippi,  113. 
Eraser's  Magazine,  23. 
Frederick  the  Great,  24. 
French  Revolution,  The, 

23,  27. 

From  Sea  to  Sea,  I  44. 
Froude,  24. 

Gabriel  Oak,  i  36. 
Gaelic  Comment,  103. 
Gaskell,  Mrs.,  70. 
Gethsemane,  xiv. 
Giles  Winterbourne,  137. 


[167] 


INDEX 


Goethe,  23,  26. 
Goldsmith,  3. 
Gray's  Elegy,  135. 
Great  Hoggarty  Diamond, 
The,  59. 

Hallam,  Alfred,  99. 
Hallam,  Arthur,  99,100, 

103. 
Hardy,  Thomas,  xm,  77, 

115,  1 1 6,  131  to  140. 
Harold,  101. 
Hastings,  Warren,  4,  9. 
Heart  of  the  Midlothian, 

The,  17,  i  8. 
Henry  Esmond,  60. 
Herbert,  Sidney,  I  20. 
Heroes  and  Hero  Wor- 
ship, 22. 
Herve  Riel,  108. 
History  of  England,  7. 
Holt,  Henry,  136. 
Household  Words  and  All 

the  Year  Round,  51. 
Howells'  Criticism  of 

Thackeray,  62. 
How  They   Brought  the 

Good  News,  108. 

Idylls  of  the  King,  The, 

96,  100,  104. 
India,  102. 
Indian  Life,  1 40. 
In  Memoriam,   96,  98, 

100,  103,  104. 


Inn Album,The,  1 08, 1 1 1 . 
Irving,  Washington,  I  30. 
Ivanhoe,  1 7. 

James,  Henry,  115,  i  24. 
Jane  Eyre,  59,  66,  68,  7  i, 

73- 

Janet's  Repentance,  8 1 . 
John  Silver,  125,  128. 
Johnson,  3. 
Jude  the  Obscure,  131, 

134,  136,  138. 
Jungle  Stories,  148. 

Keats,  109. 
Kidnaped,  128. 
King  Arthur,  104. 
King's  Treasures,  92. 
Kim,  140,  148. 
Kipling,  John  Lockwood, 

142. 
Kipling,  Rudyard,  xm, 

140  to  149. 

Labor,  26. 
Lacy?  113. 

Lady  Constantine,  136. 
Lady  Geraldine's  Court- 
ship, 1 10. 
Lady  Godiva,  100. 
Lady  of  Shalot,  The,  99. 
Lady  of  the  Lake,  The,  7, 

15- 

Lahore,  144. 
Lamb,  Mary,  41,  42. 


['68] 


INDEX 


Lamb,  Charles,  xn,  35, 
38  to  46,  123,  130. 
Lamp  of  Sacrifice,  94. 
Last  Chantey,  The,  149. 
Last  Essays  of  Elia,  The, 

45- 

Last  Ride,  The,  108. 
Lay  of  the  Last  Minstrel, 

The,  15. 

Lays  of  Ancient  Rome,  7. 
Leader,  Organ  of  the  Free 

Thinkers,  8 1 . 
Learoyd,  147. 
Leisure  Hour  Series, 

136. 
Lewes,  George  Henry,  78, 

81,  82. 

Lincolnshire,  98. 
Lockhart,  1 6. 
Locksley  Hall,  96,  97, 

100,  101,  103. 
London,  Jack,  I  29. 
London  Magazine,  43. 
Lord  Ormont  and  His 

Aminta,  122. 
Lotus  Eaters,  The,  99. 
Lovel,  the  Widower,  60. 
Lucy,  1 19,  120. 
Lyrical  Poems  of  Robert 

Browning,  by  Dr.  A.  J. 

George,  112. 

Macaulay,  Thomas   Bab- 

ington,  3  to  1 1 ,  20. 
Malory's  Chronicle,  104. 


Manchester  Grammar 
School,  34. 

Mandalay,  149. 

Manfred,  98. 

ManWhoWas,The,i46. 

Man  Who  Would  be  King, 
The,  146. 

Margaret  Ogilvie,  39. 

Marion  Evans,  79. 

Markheim,  124,  129. 

Marmion,  I  5. 

Marty   South,   136,  137. 

Mason's  Song,  26. 

Maud,  97,  loo. 

Mayor  of  Casterbridge, 
The,  136. 

McAndrew'  s  Hymn,  1 49. 

Melbourne,  Lord,  120. 

Men  and  Women,  108. 

Meredith,  George, xii,  1 1  5 
to  123,  I  24. 

Micah  Clarke,  12. 

Middle  Ages,  The,  99. 

Middlemarch,  79,  82,  85. 

Millais,  92. 

Miller,  Henry,  in  The  On- 
ly Way,  53. 

Mill  on  the  Floss,  The, 
76,82,84. 

Milnes,  99. 

Milton,  9,  107. 

Mitchell,  130. 

Modern  Painters,  87,  91, 

93- 
Monckton,  99. 


[169] 


INDEX 


Monte  Cristo,  I  2. 
Moravian  School,  1 1  8. 
Morning  Post,  London, 

118. 

Morte  d' Arthur,  100. 
Mowglie,  148. 
Mrs.  Battle's  Opinion  on 

Whist,  41,  45. 
Mulvaney,  the   Irishman, 

147. 
Murder   As    One    of  the 

Fine  Arts,  31,  35. 
My  Star,  113. 
Mystery  of  Edwin  Drood, 

The,  50. 

Napoleon  of  Rhyme,  109. 
Naulakha,  The,  148. 
New  Arabian  Nights, 

126. 

Newcomes,  The,  60. 
Newdigate  Prize,  9 1 . 
Niagara  Falls,  I  39. 
Nicholas  Nickleby,  50, 54. 
Nobel  Prize,  146. 
Norton,  Caroline,  120. 

Ode  on  the  Death  of  the 
Duke  of  Wellington, 
105.   _ 

Old  Curiosity  Shop,  50. 

Old  Mortality,  18. 

Oliver  Twist,  50. 

O  Lyric  Love,  1 08,  i  1 1, 
114. 

[I70] 


One  Word  More,  1 08. 

in,  113. 
Ordeal  of  Richard  Feverel, 

The,  115,  119. 
Our  Mutual  Friend,  54. 
Oxford,  90. 

Palace  of  Art,  The,  99. 
Past  and  Present,  22,  26, 

27. 

Paracelsus,  109. 
Parsifal,  107. 
Pauline,  109. 
Pavilion  on  theLinks,The, 

129. 

Payn,  James,  I  7. 
Peel,  Sir  Robert,  120. 
Pendennis,  60,  64. 
Pew,  I  25,  128. 
Pickwick  Papers,  50,  52. 
Pied  Piper  of  Hamelin, 

The,  108. 

Pilgrim's  Progress,  79. 
Pilgrim's  Scrip,  I  19. 
Pippa  Passes,  108,  109, 

113,  114. 
Phelps,  Prof.  William  Ly- 

on,  115,  I  I  6,  134. 
Plain  Tales  from  the  Hills, 

H5- 
Poems  by  Two  Brothers, 

99- 

Poems,  Chiefly  Lyrical, 

99- 
Preterita,  92,  94. 


INDEX 


Princess,  The,  100,  105, 

114. 

Professor,  The,  7  I . 
Prospice,  108,  i  i  i,  113. 
Puck  of  Pook's  Hill,  141. 
Pulvis  et  Umbra,  I  30. 
Punch,  59. 

Queen  Mary,  101. 
Queen  Victoria,  104. 
QuentinDurward,  17,18. 

Rabbi  Ben  Ezra,  113. 
Rasselas,  79. 
Recessional,  149. 
Red  Cotton  Nightcap 

Country,  III. 
Reid,  Mayne,  90. 
Return  of  the  Native,  The, 

I32>  *33>  !36»  138- 
Rhoda  Fleming,  121. 

Rhone  below  Geneva, 

94- 

Richardson,  62. 
Richard  the  Lion-Hearted, 

17- 

Ring  and  the  Book,  The, 

97,  106,  113. 
Robinson  Crusoe,  125. 
Rob  Roy,  i  8. 
Romola,  77,  82,  85. 
Rose  La  Touche,  92. 
Rottingdean,  145. 
Ruskin,  John,  xn,  17,  30, 

87  to  95. 


Sad  Adventures  of  the  Rev. 

Amos  Barton, The,  8  i. 
Sandra  Belloni,  121. 
Sands,  George,  74. 
San  Marco,  III. 
Sartor   Resartus,    21,    23, 

28. 
Scenes  From  Clerical  Life, 

81. 
School  of  Scandal,  The, 

I  20. 

Scotch  Moors,  127. 
Scotch  Scenes,  127. 
Scotch  Stories,  128. 
Scott,  Sir  Walter,  I  I  to 

19,  47,  52,  90,  i  28. 
Sea  Wolf,  The,  i  29. 
Seigfried,  Wagner's,  107. 
Sellwood,  Miss  Emily, 

100. 

Sesame  and  Lilies,  94. 
Seven  Lamps,  The,  87, 

92,93. 
Seymour,  50. 
Shakespeare,  47,   106, 

i  14,  I  20. 
Shaving  of  Shagpat,  The, 

118. 

Shelley,  109. 
Sheridan,  I  20. 
Shibli  Bagarag,  I  19. 
Shirley,  74. 

Sicilian  vengeance,  129. 
Sidney,  104. 
Silas  Marner,  82,  84. 


['7'] 


INDEX 


Sir  Austin,  119. 

Sire  de  Maletroit's  Door, 
The,  I  24,  I  29. 

Sketches  by  Boz,  50. 

Soldiers  Three,  147. 

Somoa,  I  27. 

Sonnets  From  the  Portu- 
guese, i  10. 

Sordello,  106,  109. 

Southey,  43. 

South  Sea  Islands,  127. 

Spectator,  58. 

Spedding,  99. 

Spencer, Herbert,  81,  83. 

Steele,  58. 

Stevenson, xn,  1 1,  39,40, 
72,  I  20,  I  23  to  i  30. 

Stones  of  Venice,  The, 
87,  92,  94,  95. 

Story  of  an  African  Farm, 
The,  1 1 6. 

Strafford,  109. 

Strauss  — Life  of  Jesus,  80. 

Study  of  Sociology,  The, 

„    83. 

Supernatural  Man,The,45 

Suspira,  36. 

Swift,  3. 

Taine,  103. 

Tales  From  Shakespeare, 

43- 
Tales  of  East  India  Life, 

140. 
Talisman,  The,  18. 


Talk  and  Talkers,  130. 
Tennyson,  Alfred,  xn,  96 

to  106,  113,  114. 
Tennyson,  Charles,  99. 
Tess  of  thed'Urbervilles, 

65>  132>  J34>  X36> 
138. 

Thackeray,  William  Make- 
peace, xn,  xiv,  13,  48, 
52,  56  to  66,  73,  99. 

They,  148. 

Thompson-Seton,  148. 

Three  Guardsmen,  The, 

12. 

Three  Ladies  of  Sorrow,  3  7 

Timbuftoo,  99. 

Times,  London,  21,  120. 

Tolstoi,  i  3. 

To  Mary  in  Heaven,  113. 

Travels  With  a  Donkey, 
126. 

Treasure  Island,  I  23, 1  24, 
126,  i  28. 

Trench,  99. 

Trevelyan,  G.  O.,  5. 

Trinity  College,  Cam- 
bridge, 99. 

Turgeneff,  13. 

Turner,  91,  94. 

Two  Voices,  The,  100. 

Ulysses,  100. 

Under  the  Greenwood 

Tree,  135. 
Unto  This  Last,  94. 


[I72j 


INDEX 


Vanity  Fair,  56,  58,  59, 

63. 

Victorian  Age,  96. 
Villette,  66,  73. 
Villon,  I  29. 
Virginians,  The,  60. 
Virginibus  Pucrisque,  40. 
Vision  of  Sudden   Death, 

The,  31. 

Waverley,  15,  19,  149. 
Weir  of  Hermiston,  I  27. 
Westminster  Review,  80. 
Wessex,  133. 


Westward  Ho,  142. 
Weyman,  I  2. 
White  Company, The,  I  2. 
Wilhelm  Meister,  23. 
William  the  Conqueror, 

147. 
Without  Benefit  of  Clergy, 

146. 

With  the  Night  Mail,  1 48. 
Woodlanders,  The,  136, 

137- 

Wordsworth,  35,  I  13. 
Wuthering  Heights,  67; 


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